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THE 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY, 



AND OTHER 



TALES, ESSAYS, AND SKETCHES. 



WILLIAM ELDER, M.D. 



NEW YORK : 
J. C. DERBY, 119 NASSAU STREET. 

BOSTON :— PHILLIPS, SAMPSON & CO. 

CIKCINXATI— H. yt. DERBY. 

1855. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



In the preface to a volume of Miscellanies published last year, 
entitled " Periscopios," the Author intimated his intention to 
follow it with another volume, " to consist of Essays, Philo- 
sophical and Ethical, more bookish in style, and more elaborate 
in texture." 

The volume now offered to the public is a compromise fulfill- 
ment of that intention. 

About fifty of the miscellaneous articles of that first publica- 
tion have been replaced in this one by a series of Essays, to give 
the work its permanent form. 

If this book shall afford to its readers but a tithe of the advan- 
tages which its production has yielded to its author, all parties 
will be satisfied. 

Not a line in it was produced for the market. It was written 
tinder impulse, not under inducement of any kind ; and, it is 
published for those " whom it may concern." 

September, 1855. 



CONTENTS. 



Enchanted Beauty 

General Ogle — A Character 

Elizabeth Barton 

The Duel 

Buff . 

Trial by Battel 

Mortuary 

French Revolution of 1848 

Visionary 

Metaphysics . 

Habit . 

Political Government 

Government — Political and Natural 

Government, an Accident — Ought to be a 

Politics — Principle vs. Practice 

Physician Heal Thyself 

Association 

Capital vs. Labor 

Capital and Labor 

The Old Grudge 

Industrial Competition 

Club Houses . 

Protective Unions — Guaranteeisrn 

Progress of the Age 

California Gold-Fever — Luxury 



Science 



Pftge 
9 

31 

66 

106 

US 

123 

130 

135 

140 

141 

244 

269 

271 

274 

279 

285 

294 

296 

300 

303 

305 

305 

307 

311 

313 



Vlll 



CONTENTS, 



Redemption 












Page 
. 31T 


Benevolence — Sin and Suffering 












. 320 


Poor-Laws 












. 324 


Homestead Exemption 












. .325 


Our Altars and Our Hearths 












. 331 


Freedom of the Public Lands 












. 331 


Wages on the Rise . . 












. &35 


United States of the United Races 










. 337 


England and the Turkish Question 










. 343 


Capital Punishment . 










. 350 


Fourth Street Murder 












. 356 


The Sabbath . 












. 361 


The Bible Question . 












. 870 


Ecclesiastes . . . 












. 377 


The Faith of Caesar's Household 












. 3S3 


Hero "Worship 












. 387 


Anthropomorphism . 












. 392 


Mythology .... 












. 398 


Heaven, a Kingdom of Uses 












. 399 


Romanizing Tendency 












. 401 


Reformers .... 












. 403 



FANCY. 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

A MYTH. 

The mythologies in which the faiths, philosophies and 
fancies of the world have taken form, have such truth and 
use in them that they endure, under corresponding changes, 
through the reformations of creed and modifications of cere- 
mony which mark the history of natural religion throughout 
all ages and countries. The essential unity of the race, its 
kindred constitution of mind and affections, its likeness of 
instincts, passions and aspirations, naturally account for the 
under-lying agreement in principles and central similarity of 
beliefs, which are traceable clean through, from the earliest 
to the most modern, and from the most polished and elabor- 
ate eastern, to the rudest northern, opinions. The nice 
transitions of doctrine from the infancy to the maturity of 
faith and philosophy, are marked by an answering variance 
in their significant ceremonials ; but, however mingled and 
marred, the inevitable truth is imbedded in all the forms of 
fable, and, under an invariable law of mind, the inspirations 
of fancy correspond in essentials to the oracles of revelation; 
just because human nature is one, and its relations to all 
truth are fixed and universal. 

1* 



10 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

Creeds and formulae, like the geological crusts of the earth, 
at once retain and record the revolutions, disintegrations, 
intrusions and submersions from which they result. In the 
long succession of epochs, whole continents have risen from 
the deep, and the vestiges of the most ancient ocean are 
found upon the modern mountain tops ; promontories have 
been slowly washed away by the ceaseless waves, and new 
islands have shot up from the ever-heaving sea. Through 
the more recent crusts the primitive formations frequently 
crop out upon the surface of the present, and the compara- 
tively modern, in turn, is often found fossilized beneath the 
most ancient ; dislocated fragments are encountered at every 
step, and icebergs from the severer latitudes are found float- 
ing far into the tropical seas. Nevertheless, through all 
changes of system, revolution has been ever in the same round 
of celestial influences and relations, and the alterations of 
form and structure have been only so many different mix- 
tures of unchanging elements, from the simple primitives to 
the rich composite moulds, into which the waters, winds and 
sun-light have, in the lapse of ages, modified them. The 
constancy of essential principles, through all mutations of 
systematic dogmas, is strikingly manifested. The law of 
adaptation links the material globe and the rational race, 
which occupies it, in intimate relations ; and the universal 
unity in the great scheme of being establishes such corres- 
pondences of organisms and processes with ideas and ends, 
that the symbolisms of poetry and mythology are really well 
based in the truth of nature, and the essential harmonies of 
all things are with equal truth, under various forms, embraced 
by fiction and fact, fable and faith, superstition and enlight- 
ened reason. 

" The true light, which lighteth every man that cometh 
into the world f " the grace that hath appeared unto all 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 11 

men ;" and " the invisible things of the Creator, clearly seen 
and understood by the things which are made," are proposi- 
tions which have the formal warrant of our sacred books to 
back the authority of rational demonstration. Moreover, 
it is pleasant and profitable to believe that " He hath not 
left himself without a witness " among any of the tribes of 
men. The human brotherhood is so involved in the divine 
fatherhood, that the individual's hold on the Infinite and 
Eternal must stand or fall with the universality of His regards 
and providence. If Canaan had been without a " Prophet 
of the Most High," if Chaldea had been left without sooth- 
sayer and seer, and classic Greece and Rome destitute of 
oracles and Sibylline revelations, the Jewish theology and 
the Christian apocalypse would stand unsupported by " the 
analogy of faith," and our highest hopes would be shifted 
from the broad basis of an impartial benevolence, to a nar- 
row caprice of the " Father of all Men." But, happily, the 
sympathies of nature, the deductions of reason, and the 
teachings of the Book, are harmonious on this point, for we 
find Melchisedec, who could claim no legal or lineal relation 
to the Levities! priesthood, the chosen type of the perpetual 
11 High Priest of our profession ;" and Balaam, notwithstand- 
ing his heathen birth and ministry among the Canaanites 
when their cup of iniquity was full ; and the eastern Magi, 
who brought their gifts from afar among the Gentiles to the 
new-born " King of the Jews," all alike guided by the same 
light, and partakers and fellow-laborers in the same faith 
with the regular hierarchy of Mount Zion. So, the Star of 
Jacob is the ■■ desire of nations," and the heart and hope of 
the wide world turn ever toward the same essential truth, 
and strive after it by the same instinct through a thousand 
forms, " if haply they may find it." 

The religious system of the Jews and Chaldeans agreed, 



12 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

with wonderful exactness, in the doctrine of angelic beings, 
and their interposition in the affairs of men. The superin- 
tendence of the destinies of nations and individuals, and 
the allotment of provinces, kingdoms and families among 
these ministering spirits, are as distinctly taught in the book 
of Daniel of the Old Testament, and in the gospel of St. Mat- 
thew of the Xew, as in the popular beliefs of the Arabians 
and Persians ; indeed, the Bible sanction is general, particu- 
lar and ample, for the doctrine of angelic ministry, as it has 
been held in all ages and throughout the world. 

The order and organization of these celestial beings, among 
whom the infinite multiplicity of providential offices is thus 
distributed, falling within the domain of marvellousness and 
ideality, of course, took the thousand hues and shapes which 
these prismatic faculties would bestow ; and in the various 
accommodations and special applications of the doctrine, it 
naturally grew complicated, obscure, and sometimes even 
incoherent ; but in all the confusion of a hundred tongues, 
kindreds and climates, a substantial conformity to a common 
standard is apparent enough to prove the identity of origin 
and the fundamental truth common to them all. 

It is to introduce one of these remarkable correspondences 
that these reflections are employed. 

Fairy tales, it is said by encyclopedists, were brought 
from Arabia into France in the twelfth century ; but this 
can only mean that that was the epoch of the exotic legends. 
In England, if they were not indigenous, they certainly were 
naturalized centuries before Chaucer flourished ; and they 
were as familiar as the catechism, and almost as orthodox, 
when Spenser wrote his Fairy Queen, and Shakspeare 
employed their agency in his most exquisite dramas. But 
their date is, in fact, coeval with tradition, and earlier than 
all written records ; and their origin is without any neces- 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. IB 

sary locality, for they spring spontaneously from faith in the 
supernatural. They are inseparable from poetry. That 
priesthood of nature, which enters for us the presence of the 
invisible, and converses familiarly with the omnipresent life 
of the creation, recognizes the administration of an ethereal 
hierarchy in all the phenomena of existence ; they serve to 
impersonate the spiritual forces, which are felt in all heroic 
action, and they graduate the responsive sympathies of 
Heaven to all the supernatural necessities of humanity. 

The live soul can make nothing dead ; it can take no rela- 
tion to insensate matter ; it invests the universe with a con- 
scious life, answering to its own ; and an infinite multitude 
of intermediate spirits stand to its conceptions for the springs 
of the universal movement. Rank upon rank, in spiral 
ascent, the varied ministry towers from earth to heaven, 
answering to every need, supporting every hope, and envi- 
roning the whole life of the individual and the race with an 
adjusted providence, complete and adequate. In the great 
scale, place and office are assigned for spirits celestial, 
ethereal and terrestrial, in almost infinite gradation. The 
highest religious sentiments, the noblest styles of intellect 
and of imagination, and the lower and coarser apprehensions 
of nature's agencies, are all met and indulged by the accom- 
modating facility of the system. 

The race of Peris, of Persia, and Fairies, of western Europe, 
hold a very near and familiar relation to the every-day life 
of humanity, by their large intermixture of human charac- 
teristics and the close resemblance and alliance of their 
probationary existence and ultimate destiny to the life and 
fortunes of men. A commonplace connection with ordinary 
affairs and household interests constitutes the largest part 
of the popular notion of them ; and their interferences 
among the vulgar are almost absurd and ludicrous enough 



14 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

to impeach the earnestness of the superstition, but our best 
poets have shown them capable of very noble and beneficent 
functions in heroic story. Like our own various nature, 
they are a marvellous mixture of the mighty and the mean, 
the magnanimous, the malignant and the mirthful ; they 
stand, in a word, as our correspondents in a subtler sphere, 
and serve to illustrate, by exaggerating, all that is true and 
possible in us, but more probable of them — our own shadows 
lengthened and our own light brightened into a higher life. 
In some countries the legends are obscure, in others clear, 
but they all agree well enough in ascribing their origin to 
the intermarriage of angels with "the daughters of men," 
and that they are put under penance and probation for the 
recovery of their paradise. So, like our own race, they have 
fallen from a higher estate, their natures are half human, 
and their general fortunes are freighted on the same tide 
with ours. 

The nursery tale of the Sleeping Beauty will serve capitally 
to illustrate our theme. Handed down from age to age, 
and passed from nation to nation, through the agency of oral 
tradition chiefly, it has, of course, taken as many shapes as 
the popular fancy could impart to it ; but the essential 
points, seen through all the existing forms, are substantially 
these : 

A grand coronation festival of a young queen abruptly 
opens the story. The state-room of the palace is furnished 
with oriental magnificence. The representatives of every 
order, interest and class in the kingdom— constructively the 
whole community — are present to witness and grace the 
scene. The fairies who preside over the various departments 
of nature, and all the functions and interests of society, are 
assembled, by special invitation, to invoke the blessings and 
pledge the favors of their several jurisdictions to the opening 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 15 

reign. The ceremony proceeds — the young queen is 
crowned ; the priest pronounces the benediction, and the 
generous sprites bestow beauty and goodness, and every 
means of life and luxury, until nothing is left for imagination 
to conceive or heart to wish. But an unexpected and 
unwelcome guest arrives — an old Elf, of jealous and malig- 
nant character, whose intrusion cannot be prevented, and 
whose power, unhappily, is so great, that the whole tribe of 
friendly spirits cannot unbind her spells. Neither can she 
directly revoke their beneficences ; for such is the constitution 
of fairy-land that the good and evil can neither annihilate 
each other's powers, nor check each other's actions ; and 
their active antagonism can have place and play only in 
issues and effects. The good commanded and dispensed can- 
not be utterly annulled, the profusion of blessings prepared 
and pledged cannot be hindered in their source or interrupted 
in their flow, but the recipients are the debatable ground ; 
they are, within certain limits, subject to the control of the 
demon, and the end is as well attained by striking them 
incapable of the intended good. The queen and her house- 
hold are cast into a magic slumber until (for the Evil will 
be ultimately destroyed by the Good) an age shall elapse 
and bring a Deliverer, who, through virtue and courage, 
shall dissolve the infernal charm. The blight fell upon the 
paradise in its full bloom, and it remained only for the young- 
est fairy present, who had withheld her benefactions to the 
last, to mitigate the doom she could not avert, by bestowing 
pleasant dreams upon the long and heavy sleepers. A 
century rolls round. The Knight of the Lion undertakes 
the enterprise — encounters the horrible troops of monsters 
and foul fiends which guard the palace — overcomes them — 
enters the enchanted hall, and wakens the whole company 
to life, liberty and joy again. The knight is, of course, 



16 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

rewarded with the love he so well deserves and the hand he 
has so richly earned. 

This is obviously the story of the apostacy and redemption 
of the human family, in the form of a fairy legend. It 
conforms closely to the necessary incidents of such a catas- 
trophe, and answers well and truly to the intuitive prophecy 
of man's final recovery. In substance and method the cor- 
respondence is obvious. Every notion of " the fall," whether 
revealed or fictitious, assumes the agency of " the wicked 
one ; " and the final recovery, universally expected, involves 
the sympathies, and employs the services, of the " ministering 
spirits," as important instruments of the happy consum- 
mation. 

This tale was presented as a dramatic spectacle last winter 
at the Boston Museum. The play is a minutely faithful 
expositor of the legend ; and it is by the aid of this fine 
scenic exhibition that I am able to adjust the details, of 
which the primitive story is so legitimately capable, to the 
answering points in the great epic of human history " as it 
is most surely believed among us." 

The parallel presented does not seem to me fanciful, and 
the circumstantial exactness of resemblance may, I think, be 
accounted for without supposing a designed imitation. 

Before tracing the specialties and their allusions, let us 
notice the general parallelism found between the pivotal 
points of the fabulous and of the authentic representations. 

The Bible Eden is introduced at the same stage of the 
story's action and in the same attitude to the principal 
characters of the narrative. It stands on the coronation 
day of its monarch, perfect in all its appointments ; the 
realms of air, earth and ocean in auspicious relation, every 
element harmoniously obedient, and the garden still glowing 
with the smile which accompanied the approving declaration, 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. IT 

" it is very good." Dominion over the fish of the sea, and 
over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that 
rnoveth upon the face of the earth, is conferred ; and the 
heavens add their felicities to the inaugural rejoicings — 
" the morning stars sing together, and all the sons of God 
shout for joy." The gifts are without measure or stint, and 
the Divine beneficence cannot be tainted in its source nor 
impeded in its efflux ; but, the intended recipients, by " the 
wiles of the enemy," are rendered incapable of the enjoy- 
ment. The sin-blunted sense and passion-blinded soul of the 
fallen race are plunged into a spiritual stupor, which sleep — 
the sister and semblance of death — strikingly illustrates ; 
and through the long age of moral incapacity which follows, 
the highest mode of life is but dimly recognized and feebly 
felt, in the dreams of a paradise lost and the visions of a 
millenium to come ; till, "in the fulness of time," when a 
complete pyschical age shall be past, the Deliverer, having 
first overcome the wicked one, shall lead captivity captive, 
and by the " marriage of the Lamb" with "the bride which 
is" the Church,"' perfect the redemption and bring in the new 
heavens and new earth. 

But — to the fable, the dramatic representation, and the 
interpretation thereof. 

The scene opens upon a rustic society, a hamlet, in the 
infancy of civilization, such as, upon ballad authority, was 
" inerrie England'- before the age of her conquests in arts, 
sciences and arms ; and before the crimes and cares of her 
age of glory replaced the days of her innocence and con- 
tentment. Simplicity of manners, modest abundance, 
moderate labor, aspirations limited to the range of things 
easy of attainment, and, opinions comfortably at rest on 
questions of policy and religion, describe the rural life upon 
Monsieur Bonvive's domain. The master, in bachelor ease, 



18 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

superintends the simple affairs of his village ; Madam 
Babillard, the housekeeper, has the necessary excitement 
without the anxiety of her post — just the amount of trouble 
that is interesting with the pigs, poultry and pets of the 
homestead. The girls, indeed, are too hasty in ripening 
into womanhood, and the beaux are over-bold in their 
gallantries ; but then, these are things of great consequence 
to her, and she is, through them, a matter of great conse- 
quence to the community, and the exercise of authority 
amply repays all its troubles and responsibilities. The 
affairs of the commomwealth take good enough care of 
themselves, generally ; the people are happy in the enjoy- 
ment of what they have, and equally happy in the uncon- 
sciousness of what they have not ; the holidays come at 
least once a week, and there is space and place for work 
and play every hour of every -day. Good consciences, light 
hearts, and natural living, carry them along very happily, 
and they have enough of the little risks and changes of 
fortune to keep the life within them well alive. The wilder- 
ness upon which their village borders is known to be infested 
with hobgoblins and demons, and there is a current belief 
that in the centre of the forest there is a princely family 
bound in a spell for a hundred years, but they have 
never penetrated the mystery nor clearly ascertained the 
facts. 

Among these simple people there is an ancient dame, who 
was old when the oldest villager first knew her, and she has 
lived through all the known generations of men. Her whole 
life has been a continual exercise of the best offices among 
the people ; she has been nurse and doctress, friend and 
counsellor, by turns, to the whole community, and they repay 
her with the love and veneration which her goodness and 
wisdom deserve. She is now apparently in the decrepitude 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 19 

of extreme age, but the frame only shows the marks of 
decay — the mind is as young and the affections as fresh as 
they were "a hundred years ago." She is the "Fairy of 
the Oak/' the youngest at the coronation scene, and the 
tutelary spirit of the enchanted family. Ever since the hour 
of their evil fortunes she has inhabited a human form, per- 
forming the charitable offices of ordinary life and mitigating 
its incident evils : but, especially, she has been cultivating 
whatever of virtuous enterprise and aspiration appeared 
among the youth from generation to generation, directing it 
into the best service, and endeavoring by it the deliverance 
of the imprisoned spirits under her charge. Patiently and 
lovingly she has striven, earnestly and anxiously she has 
watched, every promise of a Deliverer that the race from 
age to age produced. Patriarch, prophet, apostle and 
philanthropist, has each, in his degree, done his own good 
work, and the world has been the better that they lived ; 
each has added another assurance of the ultimate success, 
but themselves "have died without the sight.' 7 Iler own 
powers, and those of her auxiliaries, are vast and super- 
natural, indeed, but the championage of human redemption 
must be human, and she can but inspire, direct, sustain and 
guard the mighty effort. 

Now, a young Christian Knight, " the Knight of the 
Lion," famous for deeds of valor in Holy Land, gives pro- 
mise of the great achievement to the quick perception of the 
Guardian spirit. She has aroused his enthusiasm and sus- 
tained his zeal, disciplined him by trial after trial, and trained 
him from triumph to triumph, for still greater deeds, which 
take continually more definite shape and more attractive 
forms in the dreams and reveries which she inspires, until he 
has grown familiar with the vision and conscious of its super- 
natural suggestion, and she is able at last to intimate tha 



20 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

duty and the trial which invite him by songs in the air 
addressed to his waking ear. 

u The enchanted maiden sleeps — in vain 
To hope redress from other arm, 
Foul magic forged the mighty chain, 
Honor and love will break the charm. 

Dread perils shall thy path surround, 

"Wild horrors ranged in full array, 
Courage shall take the vantage ground, 

Bright virtue turn dark night to day." 

Drawn westward by her art toward the scene of the great 
enterprise, he reaches the village on the border of the wil- 
derness, and from the legend current among the rustics 
inferring more definitely the character of his mission, he 
accepts it in the true chivalric spirit of faith, love and hope. 
His Squire, or rnan-at-arms, who has followed him heretofore 
with an unquestioning fidelity, consents to incur the risks, 
though he has a very imperfect apprehension of the heroic 
undertaking. The devotion of a faithful follower answers 
instead of knowledge in his rank of service. He would 
rather encounter a dozen flesh and blood swordsmen than 
one ghostly foe ; nevertheless, where his master leads he 
will follow, whatever the character of the fight. The Knight 
comprehends the nature of the conflict fully 5 it is not with 
flesh and blood, but with " spiritual wickedness in high 
places " that he has " his warfare." To him the great bat- 
tle is not in the outward and actual, but is transferred to the 
inward and spiritual, sphere — into the real life — whence the 
ultimate facts of existence derive all their currents and ends. 
So felt the hero who said, in the great faith, " we have our 
conversation in heaven " — " we sit in heavenly places f and 
so felt and thought the reformer who deliberately threw his 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 21 

ink-stand at the devil's head. The region of the ideal is the 
field of the highest heroism, and every life given to the world 
in noble service and generous sacrifice is lived in the spirit 
sphere, in familiar sympathy with the good, and constant 
strife with the evil, angels. This faith is the main impulse in 
all chivalric action. Even a heroic poem cannot be created 
without it. It cannot be false, for it differs nothing in the 
constancy and efficiency of its presence from the most palpa- 
ble facts, and is proved true by the test of harmonizing 
with all other truth. 

The Knight personates the highest ideal of philanthropy ; 
the Squire stands for the lower, more palpable modes of prac- 
tical benevolence and reform. They are distinguished as 
widely as general and special providence — as the thorough 
emancipation of the soul, and the charity which relieves the 
body, or the whole difference between the apostleship of 
spiritual, and that of civil, liberty. They correspond respec- 
tively to the prophet Elisha, who saw the mountain tops 
filled with horses and chariots of fire, outnumbering and 
overwhelming the hosts of the Syrian king, and to his ser- 
vant, who saw but two men, his master and himself, opposed 
to a numerous and well appointed army. 

Such is the difference between the Seer and the Servant in 
any labor or conflict of faith — in any enterprise which 
involves the spiritual forces that rule the movements of the 
world. Throughout the whole action of the drama the 
agency and deportment of the knight and his follower are 
marked by this distinction. 

But the scene shifts ; and the sympathetic and corrobo- 
rative movements in fairy-land are revealed. The Fairy of 
the Oak appears and summons the spirits of the air, earth, 
water and fire. The elements, disordered by the fall, and 
thenceforth at war with the poor fugitive from Paradise, 



22 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

must render their aid in his restoration, that when the last 
enemy is put under his feet, the material creation, cursed for 
his sin, may be renewed with his recovery, and the harmo- 
nies of matter answer to the sanctities of spirit. The Spirits 
of the material forces obey the invocation and cordially pro- 
mise sympathy and service : 

a Throughout all space — above, below, 
In earth or air, through fire or snow, 
"Where'er our mission calls we fly, 
Our tasks performing merrily, 
Our guerdon winning happily." 

The actors, human and ethereal, thus adjusted to their 
several offices : the Knight and his Squire enter the haunted 
wood — the Squire to struggle with the grosser forms of evil, 
some as ludicrous as sad, others as horrible as atrocious, and 
all odious, coarse and palpable •; the Knight to be tempted 
of the devil, and do battle with him for the redemption of 
the enchanted family under his dominion. 

On the open front of the stage, darkened with smoke and 
foul with the offensive odors of noxious gases, the Squire is 
hotly engaged with the great dragon, in close rencontre, 
and at the same time assailed above, around, in flank and 
rear, by harpies, fiery serpents, and other forms of terror — 
the battle of life translated into coarse diablerie. The sen- 
timent and significance of the play in this take great liber- 
ties with the regular charities and practical reforms of our 
social system. The sorts of evil which these monsters so 
uncouthly represent are such as physical suffering, drunken- 
ness, violence, fraud, and the thousand shapes of slavery, 
personal and political, and of all castes and colors. They 
are represented as greedy and ugly, and full of mocking and 
malignity, but with little intrinsic capability of mischief, for 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 23 

they are really very unattractive in temptation and extreme- 
ly awkward in battle, and much more remarkable for thick- 
skinned insensibility to assault, than for any adroitness in 
the combat. The Squire bravely deals his blows upon the 
great dragon. Horror, fear, and hatred of the monster, 
earnest devotion to the " great cause/ 7 with the courage of 
full commitment, and, perhaps, some regard for his reputa- 
tion as a hard-hitter, put life and metal in his veins, and 
right lustily he mauls away. The earliest effects of his prow- 
ess are remarkable. The dragon, defending his own ground 
as confidently and angrily as if the empire of evil were really 
a rightful one, wherever sanctioned by antiquity of possession, 
dashes his ponderous jaws at the reckless agitator, opened 
wide enough to swallow him, with all his weapons and 
armor, at a gulp ; but he manages to elude the clumsy wrath, 
and, nothing daunted and nothing doubting, deals his blows 
with energy in the ratio of the rage they arouse. Cu- 
riously, but conformably enough, at every stroke another 
ring of the monster's tail unrolls. At first he was an un- 
wieldy, but not an utterly misshapen, brute ; now, he has 
become a serpent and a scarecrow ; the head and tail are 
as incongruous as the pretended righteousness of his cause 
and his villainous method of defending it. The strife goes 
on, and grows only the worse and wickeder for its continu- 
ance, till it is plain that the beast is not to be mastered 
with hard blows, and if he yields, it is because his huge, 
unwieldy bulk is exhausted with the protracted effort of 
defence, and he subsides at last rather than submits. 

So ends the battle, and then comes the triumph. The 
valorous victor, claiming all the honors he has won, mounts 
his sometime foe in the new character of hobby, and rides 
him grandly off the stage, in a blaze of gaseous glory, cheered 



24 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

most vociferously by the boys, and affording not a little mer- 
riment, mixed with admiration, to the old folks. 

What a figure that procession made ! and how exact a 
figure, too, of many another that the world witnesses admir- 
ingly. The Squire is, however, none the less a hero that 
his principles are rugged, his method rude, his ideas a little 
vulgar, and his aims tinged, but not tainted, with egotism. 
The dragons, serpents and hobgoblins must be routed, and 
he is the man for the emergency. 

All the while this palpable warfare is proceeding in open 
view, the Knight is engaged with the subtler fiends, in the 
dim and doubtful darkness of the background. Quite behind 
the scenes the severest strife is maintained, but enough is 
seen and intimated upon the stage to reveal the real charac- 
ter of the conflict. The fidelity of illustration in the conduct 
of the allegory here was really admirable. At one time we 
descried him through the gloom by the flashing of his sword, 
engaged in hand to hand combat with a host of fiends, rushing 
upon the foe with true chivalric enthusiasm ; at another, hard 
pressed and well-nigh exhausted, sternly enduring the blows 
he could not parry or repay — exhibiting, in turn, every mood 
of courage to do, and fortitude to endure, the varied fortunes 
of the field. But anon, with equal truthfulness of portrait- 
ure, he is discovered trembling in a sudden and strange 
panic, which shows the temporary failure of his faith, and 
seems to threaten his utter desertion of the field. 

In the open presence of the foe his courage never fails, but 
the stratagem of darkness and desertion successfully evades 
the sword-thrust and the shield's defence, and gives him up to 
doubt and desperation. The powers of darkness take hold 
upon him, and in his agonies of fear and suffering he would, 
if it were possible, that the cup might pass from him. In 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 25 

this moment of anguish and depression the Fairy of the Oak 
instantly appeared to strengthen him, With a touch and a 
word she reassured him, and the divine virtue again shone 
out, exposing visibly the demon of the doubt, and the good 
sword again flashed in the gloom, and the fiends, forced into 
open fight, are finally overthrown. 

Bulwer strikes the same profound fact of experience in 
heroic enterprise, in his "Terror of the Threshold." The 
reformer, however confident in virtue, and however assured 
of the goodness of his undertaking, naturally trembles at 
critical stages of revolution in opinions and institutions, long- 
established and interwoven with the existing order of society ; 
for the risk of introducing new truths may well check the 
current of a wise man's zeal. If I pull down, he will say, 
this temple whose ceremonial, though barbarous and blind- 
ing, yet supports the morals of the worshiper and the pre- 
sent order of the social system, will the liberty and light 
bestowed avail for the designed improvement, or will they 
only unsettle the securities of law, and prove occasions of 
disorder and licentiousness ? The brave bigot and fiery 
enthusiast know nothing of this indecision. The cautious 
hesitation which springs from solicitude for the best ends 
and most expedient means, never troubles their stubborn 
bluntness of purpose, nor abates their boasted consistency 
of action. But the regular procedure of Providence is 
marked by regard for the influence of conditions and for the 
established law of progress. In these things the highest 
benevolence meets impediments and suffers modifications, and 
even submits to postponement to avoid defeat ; and the agents 
and instruments of the world's regeneration have their Gethse- 
manes as well as their triumphs and transfigurations. 

Nothing in language, scenery or costume, irreverently 
asserted the allusions which I am exposing. I do not 

2 



26 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

know that either playwright, performer or spectator was 
concerned about, or even conscious of, the significant sym- 
bolism of the fable and its circumstantial exposition in the 
play. It was produced as a beautiful dramatic spectacle. 
Apart from any mystical meanings, it was a perfect luxury 
of scenic entertainment. It was so regarded by the visitors, 
and probably was designed for nothing more ; but to me 
the analogy was a surprise and a delight, growing at every 
step of the development. It struck me first when I saw 
the knight and his brave squire standing on the threshold 
of the enchanted hall, after their victory in the wilderness. 
"With equal zeal, truthfulness and devotion they had bat- 
tled with the formidable foe, but with very different aims 
and apprehensions. The difference was most manifest when 
they stood in the presence of the enchanted family. The 
Knight, breathless with awe, and melting with compassion, 
showed how tenderly and reverently he felt the moral and 
mental bondage which struck his open vision ; but the 
Squire, though so faithful and loyal as a follower, and effi- 
cient as a servant, had yet not the penetration of a seer ; 
and the preposterous spectacle of princes, counsellors, knights, 
esquires, priests, soldiers, pages, artisans, musicians, dan- 
cers, slaves, retainers — every class and calling among men — . 
all arrested in mid-action, and slumbering for a century amid 
the luxury and pageantry of a gorgeous festival, with the 
viands untasted and the cup undrained before them, struck 
him with a comic wonder and pleasant sportiveness which he 
cared not to suppress. Approaching the venerable prime 
minister of the realm, who sat with the goblet near his lip, 
immovable as death, the thirsty soldier familiarly proposed 
to drink his health, and only made mcuths at the cup when 
he found it " as dry as dust." The cheek of the dancing girl, 
who stood pivoted for her century upon one toe, he found 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 27 

" as cold as a stone ; v and the apples offered by an African 
slave to a guest, whose hand hung arrested midway in the 
reach, proved to his disappointed taste a "petrified hum- 
bug." The whole scene of deprivation and incapacity before 
him he pronounced an epidemic sleeping fever, and he won- 
dered if it was catching, and where and how he should get 
his dinner ! 

All this has its parallel and exposition in the boys that 
mock a drunkard reeling through the street, and the con- 
trasted sadness which a soul, alive to the moral ruin, feels at 
the same sight ; or, it may be witnessed again in the conduct 
of an insensible boor, and that of a person of refinement, in 
the presence of the insane ; and in general, in the sentiments 
of those who have, and those who have not, learned that 
" the life is more than meat, and the body than raiment." 

These reflections present themselves in the pause while the 
champion stands breathless with emotions of wonder and pity 
at the miDgled gloom and glory of the scene. 

But the action proceeds again. A strain of melody spoD 
taheously waking from the silence of an age, fitly preludes 
and prophesies the harmonies of the new era, and there wants 
only the " Talitha-cumi'' of the Deliverer to awaken the 
princess and her household into the activities of full life. 
At the bidding of the minstrel he advances to ber pavilion. 
Answering to his word and touch, she rises. One by one 
the women first resume their proper consciousness, and the 
revival of the men follows in proper order, till the spell is 
broken and the last shadow of the long night gives place to 
the perfect day. The renovated realm everywhere renews 
its primal beauty, the flowers of Eden bloom again, and the 
fruits regain their flavor, the wine is new in the new king- 
dom, and all the material ministries of life without respond 
to the renewed faculties within. 



28 ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

The fable has not yet exhausted the facts. Obeying the 
poetical necessities of the epic story, and conforming also to 
the apocalytic vision of the world's fortunes, which are to 
follow the first victory over the dragon, and the binding of 
the adversary for a thousand years, we have the peace and 
happiness of the disenchanted household once more disturbed. 
The Prince of the powers of darkness, that great magician 
who is the author of all the mischief from the beginning, is 
" loosed out of his prison/ 7 and gathering all his forces for a 
final battle, he surrounds the castle. The queen's army, led 
by the knight, go out to meet the grand enemy in battle, and 
he is utterly overthrown and his power broken for ever. 
The conquerors return in triumph to the castle, and in the 
midst of their rejoicings a herald from the outer wall, who 
has witnessed the scene, announces the total annihilation of 
the enemy. The elements, marshaled by their ruling spirits, 
have overwhelmed him ; a tempest of hail and fire bursts 
upon his castle, and the earth opening has swallowed up the 
last vestige of his kingdom and power. 

The battle of Gog and Magog (20th Rev.) in which the 
deceived of the four quarters of the earth are gathered 
together, and compass the camp of the saints about, is the 
very prototype of this incident in our story, and "the fire 
which came down from heaven," the " casting of the devil 
which deceived them into the lake of fire and brimstone," is 
only a different expression of the same final deliverance of 
the human family from the last enemy. 

The marriage rites close and crown the grand achievement, 
and a magnificent tableau illustrates the consummation. 
The spirits of the elements arise and array themselves in a 
vertical arch upon the stage. The centre and summit is 
occupied by a new figure, now first introduced, costumed 
appropriately in pure white, representing Truth inaugurated, 



ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 29 

or universal harmony ; the Spirit of Earth at the base on 
one side, and that of Water at the other, while impersona- 
tions of Air and Fire occupy the intermediate positions. 
This bow of beauty and promise, emblematically dressed and 
decorated, stood a happy symbol of the restored order of 
the material creation. The household, artistically arranged 
and displayed, represented the divine order of society, where 
government and liberty, refinement and efficiency, luxury 
and industry, are reconciled, and man with his fellow man is 
organized in the harmonies of the creative scheme. And, 
that the joy may be full to the utmost limits of communion 
and sympathy, the Fairy of the Oak is seen ascending, to 
take possession, in behalf of her race, of their recovered hea- 
ven — the guerdon of their services to the redeemed family 
of Adam. So, the last scene in the drama mingles the new 
Heavens with the new Earth, and all the worlds in our uni- 
verse triumph together in the general resurrection, as they 
rejoiced on the birth-day of the creation. 

I do not koow the history of the fairy tale, its age or 
origin. I know nothing of the design with which it was pre- 
pared for theatrical representation, nor do I see why it 
should be inferred, because the idea and method are so strik- 
ingly significant, that the manager, after the fashion of the 
ancient " Mysteries," intended to restore sacred subjects to 
the stage in allegorical disguise. I suppose that the fable 
is simply fancy's method of the great fact, and that its doc- 
trinals are the natural intuitions and the inevitable theory 
of the human mind concerning the mystery of life, the great 
epochal experiences of the human family, its final fortunes, 
and the interests and sympathies of other worlds in its des- 
tiny ; for such conceptions as these are general and common 
among all men. 

The question of special revelation is not affected by its 



SO ENCHANTED BEAUTY. 

concurrence with universally received ideas. The correspon- 
dence pervading all systems proves the truth, and unity of 
origin, of the essential points in all ; but in no wise touches 
the method of their revealment, discovery or propagation. 

The points and particulars of the play are none of them 
manufactured to supply the running parallel we have given, 
nor are they nearly exhausted. Moreover, it will readily 
occur that the plan of the fable illustrates the whole philoso- 
phy of world-mending by its merely human heroes. The 
current and eventual progress of civilization, religion and 
liberty can be laid down upon its scheme in the exactest 
detail of principles, which facts must follow and fulfil. The 
supernatural agencies introduced also answer this aspect and 
rendering of the myth. They well represent the material 
and immaterial forces concerned in all societary movements, 
and if they may not serve for the religion of the great pro- 
cess, they may do duty as philosophical abstractions, or as a 
beautiful system of poetical symbolism — for in the mystical 
correspondence of all these systems of ideas there is such 
fundamental unity of use. 



TALES AND SKETCHES, 



GENERAL OGLE— A CHARACTER. 

Everybody is, doubtless, everybody else's brother, but the 
family is very large, aud the difference between some of them 
is quite remarkable. Something is owing to circumstances, 
but, as a whole generation of men are born about the same 
time, and have their lifetime under very similar influences, 
the oddities and genuises that turn up among them must 
be accounted for, principally, by original differences of con- 
stitution. These extraordinary people are not only well dis- 
tinguished from the majority, but they are even as much 
unlike each other, so that they cannot be huddled together 
into conveniently comprehensive species. Every one of them 
is a variety, and no classification does much service which 
stops short of individualizing them. I, therefore, do not 
propose a science with a nomenclature for these hard sub- 
jects. Just now I am occupied with one of them for whom, 
I think, no match can be found, no class designated, whose 
known characteristics would help in the apprehension of him. 

People who don't understand Latin or Astronomy, and 
thereby miss the allusion of the term eccentric, might be sat- 
isfied with it as a general description, but it does not nearly 
meet the case. It is true, he was not held at a steady dis- 
tance from, and in a regular curve around, any fixed stand- 
ard, as a planet obeys its sun, or a satellite its primary ; but 



32 ■ GENERAL OGLE. 

this was not because lie was erratic and lawless, but because 
he was himself a centre of motion and revolution to others. 

The centric and eccentric man agree only in the fact that 
they are not concentric ; they nowhere coincide, and never 
touch except to cut each other's orbits more or less obliquely. 
Unfortunately we have no science of character fit for hard 
service ; and so it happens that every instance which we 
meet with that is specially worthy of study and description, 
is a puzzle to our philosophy. 

We ought to have a chemistry of men, but instead, our 
ignorance keeps us dependent upon such oracles as Shak- 
speare, Scott, Dickens, Hawthorne, and the poets who are 
free of their guild. We want an analysis of human nature 
for common use ; something to help common judgment to 
the insight and knowledge of high genius ; something to be 
discovered and revealed by the gifted, in such form that it 
can be clearly comprehended and safely used by the million 
— as the mysteries of the material world have been put 
within the grasp and subjected to the uses of the common 
mind. Men might be divided, for instance, like electricity, 
into positive and negative. The analogy furnishes a helpful 
hint. Logic, also, could afford the aid of its correspondences; 
the absolute and the conditional let in some light ; and so, per- 
haps, by the time the whole circle of the sciences had con- 
tributed to the undertaking, the elements of the microcosmic 
human nature might be somewhat distinguished and defined. 
Lacking technical terms sufficiently definite and significant, 
I must endeavor the delineation of the character in hand in 
the roundabout method of detailed description. 

General Ogle, then, was all that is meant and suggested by 
the words centric, positive, and absolute. He was like Emer- 
son's Representative Men, for the reason that, like them, he 
was not representative : he was an exceptional, heroic charac- 



A CHARACTER. 33 

ter, as Napoleon, Cromwell, and Jackson were : that is, lie 
owed his distinction to the qualities which distinguished him 
from everybody else, or we never would have heard of either 
of them. In the language of orator Philips, " he was a man 
without a model, and without a shadow.* 7 Nature is liberal 
of her extemporaneous productions, but she took care to 
copyright him, and it is well known that she never issues 
more than one edition of her standard works ; if for no 
other reason, because the type is worn out by the force of the 
first impression, and if for any other reason, because copies 
mutually destroy each other's necessity, and, because repro- 
ductions in changed circumstances are absurdities. 

General Ogle was not one of a litter. He was made on 
purpose, and his kind was complete in him. He was of that 
breed which leaves no heirs and needs no successors. Out 
of time and place he would himself have been only an oddity, 
or, perhaps, a monster ; but in his actual surroundings of men 
and things, there was the happiest possible fitness of rela- 
tions, and everything in him, accordingly, had its full force 
and virtue. 

The region of country which gave him his theatre, and 
the people who cast the company for the drama of his life, 
were in such keeping with him as if they had been made for 
him, and he for them. The scene was laid in one of the 
mountain counties of Pennsylvania, which lies spread over 
the junction of two ridges of the Alleghany chain. It is not 
a valley quite, nor basin, but is slightly curved or cupped 
from crest to crest of the twin highlands where they inter- 
lock and lift the intervale almost to a level with their sum- 
mits. It has no navigable streams, and its artificial roads 
are the portages which interrupt the railroads and canals 
from the Susquehanna to the Ohio river. It is thus situated 
far inland, and in an equal degree, cut off from the advanced 

2* 



34 GENERAL OGLE. 

civilization of the Atlantic coast and the sturdy enterprise 
of the Mississippi valley. The climate is severe, and the soil 
something niggardly of its fruits, and having few natural 
advantages to keep it abreast of the progress around it, its 
inhabitants, fifty years ago, like its forest trees, were nurtured 
up to a medium growth, and generally arrested there. The 
valleys on its east and west drained off the overflow of men, 
as they received the waters destined to mingle with the 
mightier tides of the world's life. 

Development requires conditions, and a sterile soil and 
dislocated position are unfriendly to great and rapid advance- 
ment of a community. But, notwithstanding the genera] 
limitation and restraint of life in such circumstances, there 
are no places more remarkable for producing men of mark — 
heroes, chieftains, and distinguished leaders — than those 
which lie in semi-barbarous conditions. Indeed, in most 
directions the liberty and occasions for individual eminence 
are larger and freer there than where men are marshalled 
according to the forms of a higher general cultivation and 
its authoritative order. The mass lies something lower, but 
society is by no means so smoothly flat as on the several 
platforms of a more artificially regulated system. Wealth 
and poverty are better balanced ; they are less injurious to 
each other ; and they do not determine rank and privilege 
to the extent of repressing great natural abilities, and 
fostering the arrogance of birth and fortune. Personal 
character, where men must mingle intimately, gives every 
one his appropriate place, and democracy is the common law 
of sentiment as well as of political relations. This checks cul- 
ture and discredits refinement, but it prevents the severance 
of society into circles, and leaves ambition free, and eminence 
possible to all. 

In the heathen mythology, the hills are the favorite habi- 



A CHARACTER. 85 

tations of the gods, and there is something in physical eleva- 
tion allied to mental and moral greatness, of the kind which 
men are accustomed to esteem heroic. Whether it is in the 
air and scenery, or in the discipline of hard conditions, or, 
whether it finds occasion in the greater difference which lies 
between genius and mediocrity there, than in the better 
general state and fortunes of the people who enjoy the more 
abundant prosperity of valley life, I cannot stop to examine. 
It suffices that the fact is well established, that mountain 
regions are quite as capable of noble natures as the ocean 
shores, and much more likely to exhibit them in relief from 
the surface of society. Such comparative prominence has, 
moreover, the effect to exaggerate the points of distinction 
and push them to extravagance, and to impart a foreign or 
fabulous aspect to the literal truth, in the judgment of those 
who are unfamiliar with such conditions and their natural 
effects. 

I do not feel assured that strangers to the style of life of 
which I am speaking will receive my story with the conn 
deuce which it deserves, nor even, that those who are some- 
what familiar with the actual history will admit every feature 
of the portrait which I draw to be the living truth ; but my 
own assurance is so clear and strong that I can only judge 
the critic by his judgment of it. I know what I assert, and 
I am upon honor with my readers. Now let me introduce 
to their acquaintance the Patriarch Politician of my native 
county. 

The person and character of this man, the most ordinary 
and the most extraordinary actions of his life, were all of a 
piece ; every thread of the web showed tne pattern, and, to 
present him well should all be woven together into his 
description. His very incoherencies stuck together and 
suggested each other; they all belonged so decidedly to 



36 GENERAL OGLE. 

him. A glimpse of him as he turned a corner, his hat hung 
upon a peg, his standing attitude, his walk, the elocution of 
his nasal interjection note, which he executed with as much 
effect as Wellington could cry "attention" to a British 
army, or any other act or fact that could happen to him, 
reminded one of everything he ever did or said in his life. 
A very singularly odd man, indeed, was he, but not a whit 
made-up or affected, and without an iota of pretence in him. 
He was as honest as steel, and as open as day-light; and if 
he made immense drafts upon the admiration of every man 
he met, he really believed as earnestly in himself as his 
most ardent admirer could do, and so he had a perfect 
integrity and all the corroborating force of it. He was all 
alive; every moment had its purpose and every action a 
determinate drift. He knew everything, could do every- 
thing, and took the responsibility of everything, and so he 
" burnt his bigness through the world." He was just what 
his own organization made him. If he had been wound up 
at his birth to go by his own springs for his whole life time, 
he could not have been less affected by external circum- 
stances and accidental influences. He was so ascertained, 
so clearly pronounced, so inevitable, that no one knowing 
him could imagine any change of conditions capable of alter- 
ing him — that transmigration itself could conceal or confuse 
him — that a pair of wings, a suit of talons, a beak, or a 
mane, could have smothered or masked the absolute General, 
or suppressed his individuality. A positive and uncondi- 
tional nature was his ; it spoke out in every tone of voice, 
appeared in every gesture, and formally announced itself 
every time he opened his mouth. 

Mahomet was somebody certain, selah, verily : General 
Ogle was his translation into the idiom of the Alleghany 
Mountain in the nineteenth century. The Prophet's iron 



A C HAP, ACT ER. 3? 

earnestness, his robust confidence, asserts itself in the 
Koran everywhere. Sometimes it bursts out in the midst 
of a narrative, suspending the sense, to clinch its verity by 
planting the word " assuredly" as a buttress for the exacted 
faith; sometimes the word stands alone, a whole paragraph, 
severed from all relations, personating the absolute and 
proving it like a voice from the abyss — Assuredly. 

General Ogle never opened or closed an argument without 
drawing up his tall person into an attitude of positiveness 
and power, starting in with the word percisely, and pointing 
out with an emphatic pine blank — perclsely and pine blank, 
that the action of the voice, teeth, and lips might answer to 
the authority and energy of the man. 

Imagine a man six feet two inches high, finely propor- 
tioned, with some depth of chest and breadth of shoulder 
added, to make his courage and confidence the surer; take 
him at the age of forty-five, the acknowledged great man of 
the world he lives in; one who really never meets a superior 
in anything to which he makes a claim, full of the feeling, 
and marked by the manner of a leader in right of eminent 
fitness and efficiency; his hair brushed straight from brow 
and temples backward towards the crown, and powdered, 
and, with an instinct that it was concerned in expressing 
him, whenever he stood in the open air his hat was lifted or 
removed often enough to give it all its proper effect in the 
impression of his presence. His waistcoat was invariably a 
dark crimson, and his standing coat collar lined with scarlet. 
His fine large face was always clean shaved, and he wore a 
bosom frill elegantly negligent, just as a painter would set a 
superb head in a cloud-wreath. 

It was not his dress that he paraded; it was as much as 
dress could do to match his mien and movement, and, crim- 
son, powder, and ruffles were tame enough to seem modest 



38 GENERAL OGLE. 

and unobtrusive in Ms service. His hat was large, with 
liberal breadth of brim, turned up behind to accommodate 
the erect collar, and deepen the pitch of the point which 
sheltered the brow and repeated and impressed the curve 
and dip of his fine aquiline nose. His foot and hand 
varied the effect of his personal beauty by their more deli- 
cate elegance; and his boots, crimped and tasselled, relieved 
the length of limbs and lightened his too imposing 
grandeur, as rhyming syllables reduce and soften the stride 
of verse. 

He walked with his head a little forward of the perpen- 
dicular, as is usual with men whose frontal brain is active, 
and always with the pleased engagedness of expression in 
his countenance which marks a man happy in speaking to 
others, who are as happy in hearing him. No eye ever 
caught him weary, listless, or vacant; he took no holidays, 
nor ever knew those remissions of engagement which oidi- 
nary people indulge in at the beginnings and finishings of 
their undertakings. He was always fully employed and 
equally intent, and the spring in him was not only strong 
enough for work, but it was easy enough for play : while 
the tide ran like a cataract, the surface rippled and spark- 
led with humour — the sunshine in dalliance with the spray 
— the storm tones rarified into music. His temper was 
sharp and high, but steady. As it never fell into feebleness, 
so it never rose into rage; the^ercisely and pine blank tone of 
feeling, ever present, kept him too well balanced for that. 
Extravagance, by other men's measure of sentiment and 
action, was common enough with him, but he was never hur- 
ried into the trepidation of an angry paroxysm. 

It is the temperament of such a man, more than anything 
else, that determines his character. By temperament I mean 
a condition of the physical organization, a make of muscle, 



A CHARACTER 39 

nerve and blood-vessel, and a manner and proportion in 
their combination. The terms of art used to distinguish 
and describe these differences and their effects are not exact 
or adequate, but I think the words tonic and sanguine 
answer best to his strength and fervor — the vigor with the 
glow — the trenchant diamond and its brilliancy ; for all the 
flash about him was the out-leaping of a steady fire, Every 
faculty within him seemed hung upon coiled springs, answer- 
ing with electric quickness to its proper excitant. 

This man was uneducated, as we phrase it. He owed 
nothing but reading and writing in his mother tongue, and 
simple arithmetic, to the schools. He was not deeply read 
in history, civil policy, law, or general literature; he knew 
no art or science as a system; but he was none the less 
equal to any emergency in affairs, or any demand for specu- 
lative thinking in matters of life and business. His instincts 
were so large and true, his feelings so sound and earnest, 
and all his aims so just and generous, that he always found 
the truth and right by sympathy with their sentiment, and 
was ever sure of the required inspiration at the moment of 
his need. Such, indeed, were his native strength and 
readiness, at all points, that it is safe to say that, in a 
representative career of forty years, in the State and 
National Legislatures, and the incident contact with the 
pivot men of politics, the General was never nonplussed by 
his defects of education. The nice taste of fashionable 
people was often shocked by his uncultured strength and 
rugged style of utterance; and his lack of scholarship was 
manifest to a degree that furnished superficial criticism With 
a frequent feast of good things. Nothing was more com- 
mon in the village than clusters of boy-men in high merri- 
ment over hig irregularities, like so many flies, after a rich 
feast, busy with the broken victuals ; but it was only in his 



40 GENERAL 0GL5. 

absence that the buzzing and blowing happened; his 
presence, somehow, always held so large a balance of force 
against the sharpness of the witlings, that the hunting never 
began till the lion had left the field. 

Probably not one man in a hundred can learn to write his 
own name, spell February, or hit the cases of the per- 
sonal pronouns, after forty years of age. The General suf- 
fered something by his lack of formal training in his youth, 
which ear-marked his style of speech and composition while 
he lived. 

An amusing instance will illustrate a slight defect of this 
sort, and his masterly skill in extricating himself, which 
never deserted him in any such exigency. 

Immediately after Madison's second election, he called 
upon his friend, Governor Findlay, then holding the office 
of State Treasurer, with the manuscript of a long letter, 
which he had written to the President, covering the whole 
ground of our foreign and domestic policy, and especially, 
the principles and measures of the Democratic party. Mr. 
Findlay heard it with not a little admiration of its merits, 
both as to matter and manner; but, glancing at the paper, 
he observed that the General had, in some hundred instances, 
written the pronoun I in little with a pop over it; and sin- 
cerely desiring to reform it, for the writer's sake, and for the 
effect that it ought to have; but impressed, also, with his 
sensitiveness to criticism which in any way impeached his 
capabilities, he coaxingly suggested the much desired cor- 
rection after this fashion : — 

"An excellent letter, General. A sound letter, sir; full 
of most capital advice, which Mr. Madison will be glad and 
proud to receive ; and thoroughly democratic in every senti- 
ment. A letter, General, that any man might be proud to 
write. Views, sir, that will make the administration equal 



A CHARACTER. 41 

to Jefferson's if they are fully adopted. But, General, they 
have a court custom at Washington, a small matter, such as 
you and I are not apt to treat with much consideration, an 
indifferent little piece of etiquette — a — " Here Mr. Find- 
lay began to stammer. The General's keen eye was on him, 
and he felt it. 

" Percisely ! what is it ?" 

" Oh nothing " — looking over the paper as if it was hard 
to find; " nothing at all, and, yet, it would be easily altered. 
A stroke of the pen here and there, merely." 

"Pine-blank," said the General. "What is it, Mr. 
Findlay ?" 

"Why, General, it has become the custom lately at 
Washington, to write the pronoun I with a capital letter." 

The General was caught, and he knew how he was 
caught, too, and he must recover himself. 

"Percisely, Mr. Findlay; all right — most assuredly, I 
know — pine-blank — you're right — no question of it." By 
this time he was ready. "'Look here, my dear sir," laying 
his hand on Mr. Findlay's shoulder, as if to reassure him, 
for the embarrassment was all on the one side now, " you 
see, my dear fellow, I had a design in it. When I write to 
a small pattern of a man, I make my capital I's two inches 
long; when I write to my equal fellow citizens, such as 
yourself, for instance, I make them the usual length; but, 
sir, when I address myself to as great a man as Mr. 
Madison or Mr. Jefferson, I always make them as small as 
possible, with a pop over them, percisely." 

I need hardly say that the General walked straight to 
his room and raised every letter of them to the dignity 
required by the rules of grammar and the etiquette of 
Washington City, before he dispatched the epistle. 

And there was matter in him as well as manner. He had 



43 GENERAL OGLE. 

Loth the insight and foresight of a ruling mind. There were 
none earlier or more efficient in the support of advance 
movements in state policy, though, from his inland and iso- 
lated locality, his connexion with their execution was less 
conspicuous than that of his principal cotemporaries. He 
represented a good fiftieth part of the Keystone State dur- 
ing that stage of its history which gave it its present high 
position, and his " aye " " aye " upon the journals mark his 
support of the measures which anticipated and insured its 
prosperity, percisely, as his "No" "No" bear pine-blank 
against the projects which principle and prudence inter- 
dicted. 

Of course the General was a democrat, a democrat in the 
best significance of the term ; for there was breadth and 
variety enough of man in him to fit him for both the service 
and sovereignty of the civil state, and to conciliate the 
" duties which he owed to his constituents with the claims he 
held due from them to himself. A true man in himself, he 
was false in none of his relations. He purchased nothing 
by sacrifice of his manliness, - and he secured nothing by 
usurpation. If he did not surrender the head to the mem- 
bers, nor lag and linger in constrained equality with the 
slow-goers, he nevertheless carried the will and conscience 
of the country with him, and represented the people with 
the strictest democratic fidelity in the public councils. 
Right well he knew the mind of his constituents, for it was 
his own. As he really governed at home, it was easy for 
him to serve abroad. So, he was neither slave nor tyrant, 
cheat nor tool, but a freeman in a worthy agency. In the 
divine order it is appointed that " the elder shall serve the 
younger," for, in the happy balancings of the thorough man, 
ambition embraces duty, and government is service. The 
representative man covers all the space that lies between 



A CHARACTER. 43 

thrones and things, and thus touching the borders of extremes, 
he is fitted to harmonize all differences of life, for all this 
variety blends into unity in himself. 

The religious sentiment of this man was strong and active, 
under modification of his peculiar mental constitution. He 
was, indeed, incapable of meekness, and suicide would have 
been as easy to him as repentance, and very like it. Devo- 
tion was in him the sympathy of sublimity. All the good 
and truth of being was grand to him, and he felt its accord- 
ance without being overawed by it. The glory in his own 
soul kindled up in the presence of the Shekinah ; he exulted 
in it, or in the language of the psalmist, he rejoiced in the 
law of the Lord ! The absolute wisdom, the unlimited power, 
the infinite beneficence, lifted him into adoration, and he 
prayed standing, with heart erect and aspiration towering. 
His practical conformity to the requirements of religion was 
in no spirit of fear or selfish hope, nor, it is but truth to add, 
in any very strict sense of duty, or simplicity of submission. 
He honored and observed just what accorded with the pitch 
and drift of his own high nature, and left, without apology 
and without regard, all other apprehensions of the prescribed 
code to the obedience of those who held and needed them. 
It was at a later day, when the hardest features of his cha- 
racter had quite outgrown the little plasticity which tempered 
them, that he sent his compliments to St. Paul by a dying 
friend, with the assurance that he "approved his writings, 
generally, and entertained for himself, as a man, the highest 
regard, affection and esteem." This, however, was only an 
exaggeration of his customary mood, for in his best days he 
would have offered his arm to an archangel in the style of a 
democratic president doing the honors of the planet to a dis- 
tinguished visitor. In a word, he was just himself, percisely — - 
a man that would have stuck to his intercession for the cities 



44 



GENERAL OGLE. 



of the plain, if he had been in Abraham's place, till he had 
nothing left but Lot's wife to offer in mitigation of their doom. 
Moses, though the meekest of men, was bold enough to reply 
to the threat of destruction to the Israelites, "forgive them, 
or blot my name out of thy book." General Ogle would not 
stop at that ; he would offer an apology for the unfortunate 
multitude at the general judgment, in the confidence that 
everything could be satisfactorily arranged afterwards by his 
own kind offices. 

Of his moral conscience, I am safe in saying, it was just 
the balance of his own impulses and opinions. His feelings 
settled the right and wrong of things among themselves with- 
out any reference to received standards. No prophet could 
be more confident of his inspiration than the General was of 
the oracle within him, and he was, moreover, not the man to 
desire a favor out of rule ; to pray or wish, in thought or 
word, for a personal benefit to soul or body, or to fear or 
evade any legitimate consequence of his own large liberty of 
soul. The accordance of his opinions and practice with the 
universal law depended, therefore, entirely upon the concur- 
rence of his own constitution and conditions. This much 
observance he frankly gave, and he offered no lip-service and 
added no slavery besides. His was a lofty love of right, a 
quick and deep apprehension of the divine order,' and a bold 
acceptance of the inmost truth of things. For the rest — the 
application of principles to conduct, in the regulation of his 
social life, he held his impulses fully capable and most worthy 
to direct him, and all in the most confident reliance upon the 
perfect understanding subsisting between himself and the 
Supreme Authority. 

I must insist again that he was religious, true and noble ; 
yet, it must be admitted, in such wise as allowed much in 
him incompatible with received rules, and, perchance, with 



A CHARACTER. 45 

the absolute right too. For in a character where the natural 
constitution is every thing, whenever the balance breaks, the 
most startling incongruities will result. Where the standard 
of faith and practice is a prescribed one, resting on its proper 
authority, in all exigencies and disturbances, the man still 
gravitates toward the point which is the fixed centre to his 
homage ; but where liberty is law and the life is all sponta- 
neous, in the confusion of accident and misadventure, the 
direction is apt to be assumed by the boldest sentiment and 
strongest feeling, as provisional governments arise in insur- 
rections ; and, like them, the decision is likely to be ruled by 
the dominant interest of the hour. The individual is best 
asserted and shows most nobly in such case, but is liable to 
work most widely out of the general harmony, and to shake 
the authority of creeds and precedents by his aberrations. 

The General, I need hardly say, was no hypocrite or jug- 
gler in casuistry ; for the incongruities and inexplicable things 
that puzzled every-day orderly people, were true enough things 
to him, though false to them and to the general rule too ; 
but it is strictly just to say in mitigation of the blame which 
they encountered and the mischief which they worked, that 
they were never perpetrated in wantonness or selfishness, 
but to attain such ends as were likely enough to justify them- 
selves when they were attained. In such minds, efGciency 
and the necessity of the case override formal systems, and 
the rule bends to the purpose ; that purpose having first 
secured their approbation for the highest reasons. They are 
often breakers but never despisers of the " higher law/' and 
if they leave the open pathway of the abstract right, by any 
constrained indirection, they will recover it again if it can 
any way lead them to their end. The best of Israel's kings 
was found unfit to build the temple. The great passions of 
great natures burst out into great crimes. Little men can- 



46 GENERAL OGLE. 

not judge them. They neither prove corruption nor authorize 
imitation in petty villainies. The midnight incendiary cannot 
justify himself by the devastation of a flash of lightning, and 
philosophy reverently hesitates to impeach the power with 
the mischief which it works. 

As an example of the General's mode of reasoning, and 
the morale of his logic, he shall answer in his own style. 
Suppose an Indian war to be the subject ; its providential 
results, rather than its justice, being its warranty. 

"Percisely," he would say, "you mustn't look at a great 
national movement the way a magpie squints into a marrow- 
bone ; history isn't written with the point of a pin. The 
Canaanites were the Indians of the Holy Land, and when 
the cup of their iniquities was full, and the Cavaliers and 
Puritans of that day wanted room, and had the better right 
of better men to fill it, Jehovah told them pine-blank to oust 
the lounging varlets. Ye see, the Lord of the vineyard 
cannot tolerate mere cumberers of the ground. The Copper- 
heads take up more room than the rest of the world can 
afford them ! They are, in fact, the greatest land monopolists 
in the universe, and the most worthless squabs at that ; so, 
the fine fellows must either go to work when the time comes, 
or else pull up stakes and put out for the Hocky Mountains, 
or for kingdom come. The earth must be farmed, not foraged, 
by man ; and the vagabonds that have neither forts nor fences 
must give it up ; their case is past praying for ; burnt brandy 
wouldn't save them. Besides, a new world was wanted for 
the new system — Democracy required a fresh soil, a wide 
field, and a clean sweep, to set up with ; and, this was just 
the continent fit for the use, percisely!" 

With him a policy depended upon its wisdom and fitness ; 
not, however, always the wisdom and fitness of first principles, 
unless they would work kindly for his uses, but the wisdom 



A CHARACTER. 47 

and fitness of the end in contemplation, and a strict obser- 
vance of all the equities which, in the circumstances, it was 
possible to preserve. That which seemed to him the necessity 
of the time, got credit for being the duty of the time, and he 
did it, running the hell-gate of expediency as safely as any 
other navigator of that dangerous passage ; for he mixed up 
no mean or personal ends with the motives of his conduct, 
and, especially to the credit of his integrity, he never mouthed 
and mumbled the maxims of morals and religion while dis- 
pensing with their acknowledged obligations. What he did 
he believed in. He was never caught dodging under the 
doctrine of human depravity and necessary imperfection, 
when he was engaged in his greatest undertakings. He 
verily believed that the best thing that could be done in the 
circumstances was right before heaven and earth ; and, being 
so, he had no apology to make, but did whatsoever his hand 
found to do with all his might. His was not the expediency 
of a narrow mind or a beggarly soul ; and he was not a time- 
server, but a politician, a practical man, the man of his own 
day; not behind it, but enough before to advance it ; not so 
much so, however, as to be its prophet only, but such a 
combination of speculation and experience as meets in a 
prophet-king — the hero of his own age, though a question- 
able one to the age that follows, if it but proves as much 
better than his own as he would have it to be. 

Of course, in some of the exigencies of Iris life, the rule got 
rather accommodating application to circumstances; but these 
were only the variations of the needle, which left its polarity 
unaffected and available when the disturbing cause was 
removed. He was no exception to the rule "no man liveth 
and sinneth not," but his errors were those of a brave and 
candid heart. 

The General's affections were quick, strong and constant ; 



48 GENERAL OGLE. 

his friendship generous and enduring ; his benevolence wise 
and steady. His sensibility to every form of beauty and his 
recognition of eminent excellence, answered like a spiritual 
echo to the touch ; for he was as capable of the luxuries as 
of the ruder heroics of a noble nature ; and the beatitudes of 
affection were richly enjoyed amidst the business and burdens 
of his crowded lifetime. He would have been a much less 
man, for any uses, if he had crushed out the sweetness to 
strengthen the wine of life. It is not the loss of one sense 
that sharpens another, but its own enhanced activity, com- 
pelled by the deforming and distorting deprivation. The 
dismemberment of either soul or body is. not necessary to the 
development of any special excellency. The General was 
not a monster but a giant, symmetrical and complete. 

Responsibility for poor men's debts, and the actual pay- 
ment of them in the last extremity, and the general care and 
direction of the improvident and incapable people in his large 
acquaintance, rested on him constantly, and was cheerfully 
borne and ungrudgingly discharged, and of course, not a little 
ostentatiously at the same time. The manners of his consti- 
tuency were robust and blunt, and great delicacy in his 
conduct towards them would have missed its aim, and he had 
no idea of reserve toward those who would bear the open 
utterance of everything that concerned them. It was, 
accordingly, not at all unusual, nor very outrageous, either, 
to find him enacting his benevolences in the public streets ; 
nor, indeed, was it quite out of the way for him to rehearse 
them to the ungrateful and presumptuous, for their benefit 
and his own honor. In the centre square of the county town 
on a public day, with a crowd of the country people around 
him, he has been heard to say, more than once, in his loudest 
tones, "I'm the father of the County. For forty years I 
have done all its thinking, and managed all its business. 



A CHARACTER. 49 

I projected your public roads, and every great improvement 
in the policy of the community. I have made you happy at 
home and respected abroad. I know every man of you from 
the acorn up to the scrubs that ye are. I know more law 
than your lawyers, and more divinity than your preachers. 
I can teach your merchants in their own business ; and there 
isn't one in a dozen of you that doesn't owe your good luck 
1 to my advice, and your misfortunes to neglecting it. I am 
the oldest Major General in the United States except Gene- 
ral Jackson, I want nothing from you — I belong to myself ; 
but I want you to know what is for your own good, percisely." 

In public debate and conversation he was remarkable for 
tact, blunt wit, and effective eloquence ; besides, he had a 
voice and manner of declamation which insured the reception 
of any thing that he uttered. Not a man in a million has 
equal command of the nerves of his auditors. Think towards 
him as they might, they were obliged to think with him, and 
they were richly repaid for such submission by the temporary 
levelness of apprehension into which they were lifted by the 
casual communion. He was felt like magnetism while he 
stood near, and when he left, men looked at each other to 
recover themselves, and did or said something not true to 
assert their independence of him. His catch-words, and a 
laugh at his egotism, or an avenging thrust at his felt supe- 
riority, usually did the duty of saving appearances ; but the 
consciousness, nevertheless, clung, and the effect remained. 
He did not hold his position in men's opinions on the terms 
that demagogues maintain their reputation with vulgar fools. 
He practiced no compliances, and flattered nobody. He was 
too strong, too honest, as well as too proud and unselfish, 
for the little arts of little men. 

His was a frank, confident style of eloquence, which had 
much more of the tone of authority than of appeal in it It 

3 



50 GENERAL OGLE. 

was intended to impart his own convictions in the directest 
way. The array of his argument was without any special 
adjustment to, or recognition of, adverse opinions ; and he 
was much less given to that style of discussion which exhausts 
the subject, than to that other style which uses up the 
adversary. He had a close, strong grip of his conclusions ; 
there was nothing wanting in the assurance with which he 
gave out his oracles, and, usually, nothing lacking in the 
acceptance they secured. He never knew the embarrass- 
ment of a doubt, and he never showed its hesitation. He 
wasn't loaded squib-fashion, w T ith alternate wads of wet and 
dry powder. When he exploded an opinion, it had the clear, 
compact, metallic ring of a strait-cut rifle crack, and, hit or 
miss, it was not safe to stand within his range. 

It may have been his own innate clearness, or, it may have 
been his large experience, that taught him the common 
impertinency of debate, and led him to prefer the method of 
decision. However that may be, and however arrogant it 
may seem in the telling, it was not very much so in the act 
and fact. His auditors did not feel that they were slavishly 
surrendering their own judgment, but rather, that they had 
never seen the subject in that light, or felt it with the same 
force before. He never argued that a thing is so and so, 
because something else is so and so, which, in its turn, rests 
upon something beyond, which is so and so ; but, that it is 
so, percisely, because it cannot be any other way ; and so 
his argument stood like a house upon its own foundation, 
instead of a crazy hut, leaning every way upon props, rea- 
sonably strong, perhaps, but unreasonably numerous. 

If any one questions the safety of a logic so incautious, he 
has yet to learn the virtue which there is in a strong will 
and sound instincts in thinking, as well as in acting, upon 
the real affairs of life. It is not more the material of thought 



A CHARACTER. 51 

than the tightness of the twist which qualifies the thread of 
reasoning and gives it texture. There was nothing slack in 
warp or woof of the General's web. It had some kinks in it, 
but he dropped no stitches. He had learned all the best 
and most available law maxims ; he knew the scriptures, as 
he said, like a book ; and, he was richly supplied with those 
sententious oracles of wisdom and prudence which have crys- 
tallized themselves into happy, self-proving maxims, in form 
for ready and effective use. If he was not a scholar, and 
had not the depth and difficult exactitude of systematic 
learniug, neither had he the narrowness incident to formal 
and special acquirement. If a scholar opened his budget 
before him, he knew how to select the goods from the trinkets 
and trumpery which mingled with them. He tried the worth 
by the use, and so derived all that had any utility for himself, 
and he declined the service of pack-horse for the balance. 
Things not clear were nothing to him, and sterling truths, 
ready for use and circulation, were as familiar to his ready 
apprehension at the first blush as if they had been old acquain- 
tances. He would have found them for himself, by his own 
intuitions, when nothing else would answer ; but if they were 
offered, he accepted them with the pleasure of present pay- 
ment on a note not quite due, but, none the less, a real debt 
outstanding. His resources were those most available ones 
which any strong man can employ. They were found in the 
largest intercourse with the notabilities of the nation, a 
familiar and responsible communion with the live world around 
him, and an exhaustless stock of innate experiences growing 
out of his own wonderfully rich and varied nature. 

I am not attempting a biography, but presenting a charac- 
ter, by the method of description, rather than by instances, 
events, and actions. The actual outward life, in any case, 
does but little more than hint the constitution of the mai? 



52 GENERAL OGLE. 

Especially where conditions restrain the play of extraordinary 
powers, narrative must fail to effect a fair presentment. 
Every incident of the General's life was full of him ; but the 
historical detail would involve that of the times, his cotem- 
poraries, and surroundings ; besides, his report rests in oral 
tradition mainly. He died before the daguerreotype and 
daily papers undertook the hole-and-corner gossip of the 
country, and no phonographer ever caught the living likeness 
of his thoughts. His cotemporaries are nearly all gone, and 
very few of them fully apprehended him. He published 
nothing. His life got utterance only in voice and action. 
It was extemporized on the instant, and the data which 
remain to the chronicler are as meagre, confused and inade- 
quate as the incidents of a battle, a storm, or a dance. I 
would gladly compromise for a fair report of one of his Fourth- 
of-July orations. It would relieve the awkwardness that 
there is in playing showman to the lion, and go far to supply 
the defects in my performance if such an auto-exhibition 
could be secured. I must even attempt to reconstruct one 
of those fossil curiosities from the fragmentary remains which 
lie scattered in my memory. 

The date is about twenty-five years ago ; the scene was 
laid at the " Coffee Spring/' a mile from our village; the 
company made up of the population of the town and neigh- 
borhood mustered en masse. The dinner, spread upon a 
table cast into a horse-shoe shape, in an arbor made with 
forks and poles, covered with bushes fresh cut and close 
piled to exclude the sun, has been discussed : the military, 
the citizens, and the boys — refreshed by the repast, and enli- 
vened a little (more or less), with rye- whisky, whisky and 
water, whisky sweetened with sap-sugar, and small beer, 
graduated to the tastes and ages of the company — are all 
brought up standing, by an order for " attention" from the 



A CHARACTER. 53 

Captain of the " Independent Bines/ 7 and the General mounts 
the table. 

" Percisely, my fellow-citizens," (waving a red silk handker- 
chief at arm's-length,) " Percisely — as Brutus, fresh from the 
execution of the tyrant Caesar, cried to his countrymen, 
'hear me for my cause, and be silent that ye may hear ;' so 
I come before you to speak the truth in the love of it. I 
stand here as Abraham, when he was returning from the 
slaughter of the kings, stood at the feast which Melchisedek 
prepared for the grand old hero, to bless the name of the 
Most High, who hath delivered all mine enemies into my hand. 

" Chederlaomer and Julius Caesar, and that apostate demo- 
crat, Xapoleon, all died in their sins, for their evil works 
went before them to judgment ; Pontius Pilate cut his own 
throat, because he had condemned that Just One ; Judas 
Iscariot hanged himself in remorse for betraying him ; and 
George the Third, wilted away in his wickedness like that 
old pine-tree there, struck by the lightning of heaven — dead 
at the top, while the miserable old trunk still sticks in the 
earth by its roots. Honor to the race of regicides ; destruc- 
tion to the oppressors of the people everywhere; and a stout 
arm to match the bold heart of sound democracy all over the 
universe ! 

"My dear fellows, you don't understand it ; but it is as 
clear as light to the children of light, that the Lord reigneth 
and the devil's a fool. I know it ; in threescore years and 
ten, I never saw the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging 
bread. Stretch yourselves up into the light; swell your 
breasts into the upper air. If you go nosing about in the 
dirt for a living, and dozing in the mud for enjoyment, the 
shadow of a leaf will hide the whole heaven from your sight. 
Pigs have no prospects. They grunt when they are comfort- 
able, and squeal when they are hurt, but they don't understand 



54- GENERAL OGLE. 

the course of things. And if any fine fellow here feels hi3 
bristles rising, he knows who I mean by the parable, percisely. 

" My hairs are white, like the fields of Judea, ready for 
the harvest of the great reaper, and these shambling shanks 
are beginning to shrink from their duty ; but, my soul laughs 
at the lengthening shadow of my years. Let this crazy 
frame decay; I shall break out of it one of these days, like 
a sun-burst upon a mountain-top, when he comes out of his 
chamber in the east to run his glorious race around the arch 
of heaven. I am not old, and, when you bury my bones, 
remember that I am not dead. Peter was bewildered when 
he proposed to build tabernacles for Moses and Elias on the 
Mount of Transfiguration. When we have done our duty 
here we go up higher ! When this frame has lost all its 
strength and beauty, the kindly mother-earth will sweeten 
and freshen it into youth again, and the limits of its life will 
widen into glorious liberty. Hallelujah ! The light of these 
eyes is growing dim in the light of paradise! 

" Idiots and drivellers, from seventeen to seventy, think 
the world is coming to an end when worn-out frames and 
worn-out things are blown up: but such dotards are but 
first-cousins to the beast that perishes — all but the beauty. 
Such cattle have about the same right to scratch their heads, 
for any thing there is in them, as so many ring-tailed monkeys ; 
and, very likely, will make as much by the operation. (Here, 
Bill, turn up a clean tumbler, and give me a drink of water.) 

"I was among these grand old hills, my sweet fellow- 
citizens, before the oldest of you were born ; and, snipes and 
night-owls ! did you ever detect any humbug in me ? If you 
did, out with it. I'm so tired of barking that I would like 
a bite. Try your teeth in this tough old hide, ye whipper- 
snappers. There's blood in me that would make you as 
drunk as blazes for the rest of your lives, and give you the 



A CHARACTER, 55 

first peep of glory that ever opened upon your benighted 
souls. 

" The follies of the dead are buried with them. They were 
not worth minding then nor remembering now ; but didn't I 
tell your respectable daddies that they were making fools of 
themselyes in the whisky insurrection ? Blackguardism is not 
democracy! "When Washington came to Bedford with the 
army, the Alleghany Mountain rocked under his footsteps, 
and the diminutive little manikins that danced like drunk 
monkeys around then- pig-nut liberty-pole in the diamond 
oyer there, trembled in their shoes till you could hear their 
toe-nails jingle. I was a democrat, a Jeffersonian democrat 
then, as I am now; but I wasn't a demagogue, a coward, or 
a broad-mouthed brawler against my country, its laws and 
the constitution. 

"Your grandmothers can tell you what a rumpus the 
same ninnies raised around me for the first wagon-road made 
oyer the mountains to Pittsburgh. It would break up the 
pack-horse men, forsooth, and the tavern-keepers and horse- 
breeders would be ruined, when one wagon could carry as 
much salt, bar-iron and brandy from Baltimore as a whole 
caravan of half-starved mountain ponies ! But I told them 
then, that, of all people in the world fools haye the least 
sense, and that they would live to learn that the best way 
is as good as any; for, when I was but a boy I discovered 
that nothing less than too much is plenty, in the American 
meaning of the word. That's the difference between a man 
of faith and the snobs that do all their travelling in a tread- 
mill. 

" But with such snipes nothing can be done. Cure them 
of witchcraft and they slide into fortune telling, or some other 
stupid kind of wonder working; for they understand nothing, 
either by insight or experience. After a while when the 



^6 GENERAL OGLE, 

prosperity which they at first resisted poured down upon 
them from a spout, they went crazy, and I was mobbed 
again for standing by Simon Synder's veto of that batch of 
shin-plaster banks which the legislature chartered by a two- 
thirds vote, and gave you your keepsakes of Owl-creek and 
Mutton-town bills. And now, wheeling gee, as much too 
far as ye went haw before, you are bellowing at the top of 
your voice, and the end of your wits, against all bank paper ! 

" Is it any wonder that I keep up my old grudge at the 
devil for making such people! Jack (to a darkie carter, 
occupied at the other end of the table upon the breast-bone 
of a turkey which he was polishing), you may as well quit 
beating and bothering your mules ; make their breech-bands 
of sheet iron, and the traces of cob-web: for the more you 
wallop them, the more they won't go. My donkeys are of 
the same breed percisely, and they are all on a spree just 
now, kicking out their hoofs at free-masonry! That's the 
secret of all the villany and blundering in legislation, is it ? 
Butter your brains and give them to the dogs for a New- 
Year's gift, and let somebody else do your thinking. Oh, 
it's enough to sicken a snipe to hear a twopenny pettifogger 
railing at the great men who have given us our free institu- 
tions, and built up this model republic into a world's wonder; 
and to see a herd of drivelling noodles drinking in his pro- 
fanity like the words of life ! But providence always had 
his hands full of such forlornities. If he can bear with them, 
I may. He will find the men somehow, when the time comes, 
to do up the world's work upon the principles of everlasting 
truth. The universal laws keep the earth in its orbit, and 
all the crawlers on its surface can't shake it out of shape, or 
turn it from its track. I believe and live. Behold, ye cles- 
pisers, and wonder and perish. 

"And there is the common school syvstem that I have been 



A CHARACTER. 5*7 

laboring for until it is at last fairly on foot. See that you 
keep it alive, and make it answer the glorious purpose of its 
establishment. Don't clip it down to nothing by your beg- 
garly economy. I wish to the Lord that you understood 
thinking as well as you do eating, and could feel an empty 
head as painfully as an empty stomach. Can't you under- 
stand that keeping money in your pocket is not saving it ? 
A dollar in a buckskin purse won't breed a sixpence in a 
hundred years ; but employed wisely in the service of soul or 
body, it will bless the one and glorify the other. If you can't 
see the policy of education, make a religion of it. The world 
of ideas is the world of spirits. Introduce your children 
there, for every good thought is a guardian angel to the dear 
little lambs. And don't stop just where reading, writing and 
arithmetic can be worked into dollars and dimes. Carry 
them through and over this sordid world into God's world — 
up to the circle of the heavens, where He sits governing the 
universe by his laws. Every discovery in the truths of 
nature is so far into the counsel and confidence of the Supreme 
Ruler. Only the man that has the mind of God is Godlike. 
Xow, for Heaven's sweet sake, educate your children. You 
may talk stupidities about the salaries of public officers, as 
you did against me for voting a gentlemanly per diem to the 
members of Congress ; but don't cheapen your schoolmasters, 
till nobody but bankrupt cobblers, habitual drunkards, crip- 
ples, consumptives, and such other ugly incapables, can be 
got to serve you, for very shabbiness of the salary. Buy 
cheap store-goods, if you like, for when they wear out you 
will know it, and can replace them ; buy cheap provisions, 
and eat the less of them ; buy any thing cheap but cheap 
talents. Don't venture upon that speculation, for you are 
no judges of the article ; and the only way for you to insure 
the excellence of the quality, is by the liberality of the pre* 

8* 



58 GENERAL OGLE. 

mium which you will offer for it ; that will bring the genuine 
into the market, and the bogus will be clearly exposed by 
the difference of the ring, weight and shine. 

"I go in, ye see, for the arts of peace, the prosperity of 
the people, and all that blesses and embellishes the life of 
man ; but I would not forget, on this great Sabbath-day of 
the nation, the glory our country has won in the field and 
on the wave. It isn't the pluck of the bull-dog or the game- 
cock in a soldier which I admire, but the high-souled heroism 
that chooses liberty above life, and knows how to make 
victory a blessing to the world. 

"In the Revolution, and in the late war against Great 
Britain, we fought against foes who were, only a generation 
or two back, bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh ; born 
brothers, they were, of course, our equals in all qualities of 
manhood. They had the advantage in numbers, arms and 
all the appointments of war ; but the strength of the cause 
was ours ; we had the right, and the Lord of Hosts was 
with us. But, if we had been unworthy and incapable, if 
we had been poor in faith or feeling, poor in heart or hope, 
we would not have been elected to the office of banner-bearer 
in the army of universal freedom. The covenants of Heaven 
are made with faithful men ; and a people that falls away 
from its worthiness is rejected at last, though still beloved 
for the fathers' sakes. While ye think ye stand, take heed 
lest ye fall. 

"This is a great country, and it isn't all fenced in yet. 
Very little of it, in fact, is so far finished as to be ready for 
the first coat of paint. All the wilderness of the new world 
is ours ; for we alone can occupy it. The dwarfed provincial- 
ism north and south of us have no expansive growth in them. 
French and Spanish haven't the right kick in their gallop to 
match us in the race of empire. I have no contempt for any 



A CHARACTER. 59 

of God's creatures ; they'll all weave into the web of exist- 
ence somewhere, or they will do for selvedge and fringes ; 
but showy and shabby is a bad mixture to make up by them- 
selves. They are not of the right stripe for democrats ; they 
don't come up to the full measure of the American pattern. 

"I tell ye, my dear fellows, we have had the wool pulled 
over our eyes by the European writers which we are all the 
time reading. Of course they know no better than to call 
Bonaparte a hero, and Wellington another for conquering 
him. That will do for t'other side of the water, for every- 
thing is great or small by comparison. But comparing 
themselves with themselves they are not wise ; and they 
don't know enough to discern the true standard. Heaven 
help them to better doctrine and better diet. They will have 
such Generals as Washington and Jackson when they have 
the same occasion for them ; and when they go to fighting for 
progress instead of power, and organize their civil institutions 
in the faith of the people's honesty and capacity for self- 
government, fully, fairly and faithfully, they may put their 
achievements down upon the page of history in parallel 
columns with ours. 

" Xow, I have a few words to say that I don't want you 
to forget. Turnpikes, canals and railroads must be made, 
whether they run in front of your cabin doors or not. These 
mountains must be tunnelled; those valleys must be paved ; 
must be, and will be. So, don't let any of those miserables 
who sometimes get themselves into your legislature set you 
against the necessity which is upon you ; making fools of 
you, and scoundrels of themselves, by pretending that they 
will lighten your taxes and reduce the State debt. It is 
your opposition that will make your taxes heavier, and still 
will not prevent the inevitable march of public improvement. 
Support an enlightened system of public works, and choose 



60 GENERAL OGLE. 

iionest and capable representatives — choose gentlemen, and 
gire the snobs the cnt direct. In the compromises and 
accommodations of conflicting policies, which must take place 
at the seat of government, nothing will save a man but sound 
instincts and high personal qualities. For rough roads take 
a sure-footed nag, though he be a little headstrong and 
hard in the mouth. I never prophesied unto you smooth 
things, I never daubed you with untempered mortar, and I 
never betrayed your trust in half a century of public service. 
" Finally — until every man is as wise as his neighbor and 
as good as he ought to be, you must be governed by the 
majority, and that necessity will divide you into parties — two 
parties, mind ye, or one and a parcel of fragments. Now, 
the greatest of these will have the power in its hands, of 
course. How will you mend it when it goes wrong ? By 
drawing off into as many little squads as there may happen to 
be differences of opinion amongst you ! This will only 
strengthen the party that you are trying to control. The 
mountain springs refresh the lakes by flowing into them, not 
by running off into a multitude of puddles to stagnate in the 
sun ! Parties must be built upon general views and broad 
policies. Organize as you may upon transient and trivial 
contingencies, it is all fuss and foolery. A party with any- 
thing positive in it will outlive its own abuses and your 
grumbling; or, if the real majority of the nation is too corrupt 
to purify itself, it will not be improved by changing its chan- 
nel. The judgment day divides the world into two classes 
only — one right and one wrong. Do you think you can make 
a better or more accurate division ? My dear fellow citizens, 
don't be caught starting aside after every vagabond fancy 
that inspired idiots can scare up. Within the proper party 
of truth and progress will be found all the available means 
of reform that political agencies can ever effect. Jonah 



A CHARACTER. 61 

withdrew in a fit of disgust because the Lord would not 
destroy Nineveh for its corruption, and sheltered his indig- 
nant head under a gourd that grew up in a single night, and, 
of course, perished in a night ; whereupon he wished himself 
dead, and fainted outright. Better bear your small per- 
centage of your neighbor's sins and blunders till they are 
cured, than curse the world and quit it in a passion. It is 
good enough for you to do your duty in, and too good to be 
condemned as long as it is getting better. 

" Fm done, for I don't jump off the stage or stump, like 
the pony in a travelling menagerie, through a blazing hoop ; 
and I wouldn't whine a dying doxology to my speech if I 
knew that it was the last that I should ever make to you in 
the flesh. I will speak to you from my grave. My voice 
will echo from these hills, as long as the truth of my life is of 
any use to you, and you are worthy of it. Wherever I am — 
here among you, or there above you — I'll be doing my duty 
and minding my own business — Go home and mind yours." 

Saints and savages are much more simple compositions 
than the pivot-men of practical affairs ; even the heroes and 
enthusiasts of most frequent occurrence in history are easily 
comprehended, for they are orderly and consistent in their 
movements, under the pressure of their singleness of impulse 
and steady concentrativeness of drift. A man governed by 
one monopolist passion, and devoted to one absorbing object, 
works in his vocation like a machine, and is no more a wonder 
or a puzzle than fire or water in their grandest style of ope- 
ration ; but those complex and intricate combinations of 
manhood whose elements are remarkable at once for their 
energy and divellent tendencies, like the multiform ingredients 
of vegetable and animal organisms, are as difficult of analysis 
as of integral activity and consistency. The faculties of such 
a man as General Ogle, each strong enough in its natural 



62 GENERAL OGLE. 

force, and all sufficiently varied and numerous, to furnish a 
dozen monomaniacs with extravagance, or a dozen heroes 
with inspiration, present a most difficult subject for specula- 
tion ; and, when kept in constant effervescence by an active 
life, in a rude society, afford a mixture of results not easily 
reconciled. He is not to be measured by the standard of 
common lives, nor can his actions be safely resolved into 
examples for ordinary men's conduct. Things conformable 
and manageable enough in him would be monstrous in men 
of more partial make and with less balancing energy. Even 
in his best days, a strong impulse, aroused by a critical emer- 
gency, often ran beyond its proper limits and overleaped the 
boundaries of rule, so that nothing less than the reaction of 
his own great reserve forces might restore him to rectitude 
and order. At high tides in the current, in more than one 
instance, one or another of the provisions of the decalogue 
was temporarily submerged, and the trespasses of the Patri- 
archs and Prophets got an occasional rehearsal in the excesses 
and misadventures of his life. — And in the end, when age and 
circumstances conspired against him ; when his natural 
strength abated, and his surroundings fell into general dislo- 
cation, his instincts and appetites, like the chemical forces 
which come into play as the vital energies decline, assumed 
the government, the strength of his nobler nature failed, and 
his sun sat under a cloud of darkness. 

At seventy-five years of age the coarse excitement and 
wild illusions of inebriety replaced the healthy activities which 
had been the very wine of life of his better days. The busiest 
occupation, the most perilous risks, the heaviest responsibili- 
ties, of his eventful experience, had never quite satisfied his 
great necessities ; and now that the aching vacancy of leisure 
and enforced inaction had come before "the silver cord was 
loosed, or the golden bowl was broken, or the pitcher had 



A CIIAHACTER. 03 

broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern," 
he turned, by a sad necessity of such natures, to the delights 
of those passions whose indulgence remained possible, after 
his nobler faculties had lost their occasions and the power of 
exclusive occupation. 

The change was as rapid as it was terrible. I had seen 
him in the glory of his strength. I was a boy, indeed, and 
could not fully comprehend or estimate him ; but a whole 
man is never wholly misunderstood even by the least capable 
observer ; and if the impression was somewhat confused and 
indefinite, it was, nevertheless, grand and inspiring. He was 
a gentleman of the olden time, one of those denii-gods of the 
pioneer period of society that seem compounded of the savage 
and civilized epochs which they unite. He had outlived the 
fabulous era to which he appropriately belonged, and was as 
ill-assorted to the new times as the whole hero race of our 
idolatry would be if we had their personal presence now 
instead of their consecrated memories. 

A ruined tower is picturesque, for it had no sacredness, 
but a temple in decay is humiliating. It is the tomb of a 
god — the wreck of a religion — a worship in dishonor. When 
I met this man again after some years of absence from my 
mountain home, with my earliest apprehensions of him shar- 
pened and heightened by the distance and difference of the 
common-place platitudes of fashionable life, and graced by 
those touchings of imagination which adorn our ideals and 
accommodate the object to the homage which we must give 
somewhere, to keep our faith alive and our souls in tone — 
when I met him again, bowed with years, in a sadly disor- 
dered dress, with a dimmed eye, unsteady lirnbs, untoned 
features, and nothing of himself left but his noble form ot 
head and that erect hair, standing like a monument of the 
dilapidated man, I felt the contact like a blow. My habitual 



64 GENERAL OGLE. 

reverence groped for its object in that chaos like a child in a 
darkened chamber seeking for its father. Standing over his 
grave I could have recognised him. I could have found him 
all alive again in every street ; and on my play grounds his 
presence would have answered to my apprehension, where- 
ever I turned, if only he had not been there — there as he 
was. I could, I think, have borne the shock of all natural 
change. The even rush of years would have left some noble 
traces to adorn the ruin ; a second childhood would have 
preserved some symmetry in decay ; but, he remembered 
me, and had forgotten himself ! Like the chieftain of a 
clan, he was naturally a foster-father to the children of his 
early friends. This, too, was extinguished. He had lost 
the habit of that respect, the consciousness of its mutual 
claims, and the sympathies and demeanor of the relation. 

Why does the church pray for deliverance from sudden 
death ? The battle-field is the fittest death-bed of the sol- 
dier. When "it is finished," let the strong struggler give 
up the ghost, that the body may not become the grave of 
the soul, nor the holy ones see their own corruption. 

Before this strong man became incapable of active, useful 
life, his relations to it were divorced, and his great energies 
were left to prey upon themselves. He was not born to 
rust but to wear out ; and when society refused his ser- 
vices and repelled his participation, the appetites, which had 
been suspended and controlled by half a century of intense 
engagement in worthy offices, resumed their importunities ; 
the vices of youth displaced the proper dignities of age, 
and the offended witnesses of his fall lost their confidence yi 
human virtue, by the shocking exhibition of its weakness. 

I did not reproach him for his infirmity. It was not his 
fault, but the fault of a wretched meagreness and meanness 
of conditions which could not hold such a mind and heart to 



A CHARACTER. 65 

their highest uses and noblest capabilities to the end. I 
date his death at the period of his discharge from public 
duty ; there justice sets up his monument, and its broad 
shadow covers all that lies behind it. 



ELIZABETH BARTOK 

I have a story to tell, not to make. It is true to a 
thought— true as my senses received it into my feelings and 
reflections — and I am very sure that it has suffered no dis- 
tortion or exaggeration there. 

The occurrences are now twenty years old ; the locality 
is middle Pennsylvania, in a narrow valley, lying between 
two of the easternmost ridges of the Alleghany Mountains. 

I had just finished the usual term of medical study, and 
attended one course of lectures at Philadelphia. Of the 
experiences common to my tribe, I had my average — an 
exhausted purse, and a disappointment in a love affair. 
Under the compulsion of these, and the notion that a little 
practice of my own, with its attendant responsibilities (for 
which, I believe, I was better prepared than usual), would 
be fine training for my last session at the Medical College, 
I planted myself at a " + roads" in the centre of a good 
settlement. A grist mill, saw mill, distillery, smith shop, 
and retail variety store, did the business of the neighborhood; 
a weekly mail brought us our letters and newspapers ; and 
I undertook the health of the vicinity, that is to say, of a 
region of hill and valley forty miles in compass. 

A mile below us, on the stream that watered our pretty 
valley, there stood a long, low-roofed, rough-built, one- 
story stone house, which was called the " Union School- 
house." Its primary use was for the instruction of the 
children of the district; but as it was the only public build- 
ing in the neighborhood, it was used occasionally for all sorts 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 67 

of public meetings, and on Sundays regularly, under some 
tacit agreement, by half-a-dozen sects, for preaching and 
social worship. There, about noon on a summer Sabbath, 
might be found, at the time I speak of, the persons whom 
I wish to introduce to the reader's acquaintance ; and, 
assuming that everybody knows enough of the general char- 
acter of such audiences to answer our present purposes, I 
will content myself with describing particularly only three 
or four persons in the congregation, whom we are concerned 
to know more intimately. They are not the only notewor- 
thy people of fifty or sixty present ; for life is not so poor 
in variety and interest among our mountains, but I cannot 
pause in my narrative now to illuminate its margins with 
gratuitous portraiture. 

The clergyman is entitled to our first attention. This is 
the first year of his ministry. He is a stray slip of Virginia 
aristocracy, who has found scope for his enthusiasm of 
religious sentiment, and opportunity for his generosity of 
self-denial, in circuit preaching through a mountain range 
of three hundred miles' compass, which he must traverse once 
every month, preaching, on an average, " once every day 
and twice on Sundays." He is marked by better education, 
better manners, and more refinement than the men among 
whom he ministers ; but he subdues his tastes and con- 
forms his general demeanor to the coarse conditions of his 
w T ork, with all the devotion, but happily, none of the pre- 
tence of a martyr. In good truth, he is very much out of 
place in this rude region, except for the rare spirits, one in 
a hundred or a thousand, who, perchance, may apprehend 
him. But he came among us in such singleness of heart and 
cordial devotedness of spirit, that he is as much disguised, 
to selfish and superficial people, as a prince in temporary 
banishment. And he would have it so, for he wants the 



£g ELIZABETH BARTON. 

discipline of such duty ; and the concealment of his accus- 
tomed style of life is necessary to the free working of the 
experiment. 

The congregation felt that indefinable something in him 
which distinguishes the gentleman-bred, but missing all the 
pretence and mannerism, which, in their idea, marked it, 
they generally accepted him at his own modest estimate, 
and the secret of his family and fortune escaped the gossips. 
He accepted his hundred dollars a year, made up by some 
thirty little congregations, as composedly as if he needed 
such a pittance, and he took the hospitalities of the circuit 
as contentedly as if their best was something quite agreeable 
to him. 

Not unfrequently the position of the preacher in this 
rugged region is a matter of ambitious aspiration, notwith- 
standing the rudeness of the people, and the hardness of the 
work; for some of our mountain clergy are the coarsest men 
within the boundaries of the brotherhood ; but often — very 
often — the service is a sacrifice of rich sensibilities and a 
dedication of fine talents to the. most repugnant forms of 
duty. Such was the person, and such the attitude to his 
work, of our friend, the Rev. George Ashleigh. It were 
well for our new world if the ministerial office were generally 
filled by such men as he. 

Among the women belonging to this society there were 
two girls, whose characters were brought well enough to 
the surface by the events of my story to allow the hope of 
adequate presentment. 

Nancy Barton's general character was strength and style. 
Her religious impulses were very active, her social senti- 
ments free and strong, and her selfish feelings, also, sharp 
and importunate. She was defective in imagination proper, 
but the life of passion warmed and strengthened her thoughts 



ELIZABETH BARTON. (39 

into grandeur, and her verbal eloquence was of the highest 
tone conceivable in a woman destitute of literature and the 
culture of refined companionship. The custom of the church 
admitted of female participation in the public devotions, and 
Nancy found scope in a stormy eloquence of prayer and 
exhortation, for talents that had no match in such use within 
the circuit of a hundred miles. 

She was strongly, rather than handsomely, made. There 
was a firmness, weight, and force, with such elegance as 
belongs to them, in her make and manner, that kindled admi- 
ration, unmixed, however, with tenderness and affection. 
Her face, well fitted for the elocution of her strong thoughts 
and burning words, was strikingly brilliant, and even hand- 
some enough, without being quite agreeable, or, in any 
fashion, fascinating. It turned, it may be, too fully and 
boldly to one's gaze ; it confessed, perhaps, too much con- 
sciousness, and too much of the purpose of its own working, 
even in the rapture of its excitement ; for there was a little 
of that system in its passion, which corresponded to the full 
elaborateness of her robust oratory. The trouble was, that, 
while her rhapsodies were in the vein of inspiration, the 
delivery intruded the feeling of much study and large prac- 
tice with an aim. 

Nancy was an orphan, and dependent, for her support, 
upon her industry or the hospitality of her church friends, as 
she pleased to choose between these two sorts of reliances. 
She compromised and mixed them as her tastes and purposes 
required. She had made a long visit, the year before, to a 
distant town in one or other of these characters, and had 
returned with no slight advantage of travel and observation 
from the trip. A few weeks in the family of a lawyer, who 
had lately joined the church, put some polish upon Nancy's 
manner, and worked some notions into her understanding, 



10 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

which were not a little available, both for her private and 
public uses in our little valley. It was evident to me, at 
least, that it might somehow concern the young clergymen 
whom the fates should favor with appointments to this cir- 
cuit for a year or two to come. It was, however, so obvious 
that Mr. Ashleigh was not a marrying man, that Xancy 
made no demonstrations in that direction, and, I believe, his 
general demeanor effectually protected him wherever he went 
from the usual liabilities of his exposed position. 

But now that Xancy has had her usual foreground 
privileges and preferences, and made her due impression upon 
the company ; and after she has shaken hands with every 
body entitled to that ceremony before the congregation sepa- 
rates ; and while she occupies Mr. Ashleigh with questions 
about the result of the last camp-meeting, followed by inqui- 
ries about the health of the most interesting members in the 
most fashionable parts of the circuit, and especially for the 
health of "Dear old Father Ball," the Presiding Elder, and 
of Brother Sanford, the eloquent young preacher, that is the 
present agony among church gossips, — all uttered in tones of 
unimpeachable meekness and pleasing melody, touched with 
the slight abstractedness of a devout spirit, — let me introduce 
you as well as I can to her cousin Elizabeth ; whom Xancy's 
presence has covered and shadowed until the last moment for 
lingering has arrived, and the preacher and the old folks have 
moved decidedly for the door. 

Elizabeth Barton was something above the middle size, 
and might be taller still, with advantage, if her bearing had 
but a little pretty pride in it. She was finely formed, with 
such a mould of limb, and style of carriage, and rhythm of 
movement, as result from the best combination of strength 
and grace in form and arrangement, the best health and 
habits, and the best tone of mind and feeling, which the laws 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 71 

of correspondence can any way achieve in actual life. Her 
hand and foot, especially, were models, and her face, in every- 
thing but the consciousness of high mental power, was per- 
fect in appropriate beauty. Her head had that symmetrical 
elegance that is never wanting in a fine character. Her 
complexion was rich and very pure, and the features regular 
and finished, but the forms and tints, though faultless, seemed 
subdued to the air of a hard service ; and her dark chesnut 
hair, checked of its fullness and effect, was almost hidden from 
view by the severe restraint of its arrangement. My first 
sight of her was such a glimpse as I am now giving to the 
reader. I marked then the rich resources of physical beauty 
that lay covered there and unpronounced, the serious air of 
dedication to some onerous duty, and the deep religious 
renunciation of all the delights of sense and all the pride of 
life. She spoke modestly and kindly to those who were near- 
est to her, while she adjusted her bonnet and waited till the 
company gave her room to pass ; and when she moved, it was 
remarkable for nothing so much as its quick directness and 
unobtrusiveness. She seemed to have no gossiping to do, 
and no time to spare, as she stepped rapidly from the door, 
and, turning the corner of the building, bent her course 
toward home. She had two miles to walk ; most of it over 
a rugged ridge, which separated the little glen where she 
was born from the valley in which the Union Schoolhouse 
stood. It was, in fact, but a rift made in the hills by a 
watercourse, with a narrow border of arable soil, raggedly 
irregular ; in spots affording room for a cottage, a little 
cornfield, a garden, and so much nieadow as might feed a 
cow or two through the winter. Just where Tommy Barton 
lived, the rivulet was a little more liberal of margin and gave 
space within a mile for three other tenements ; one occupied 
by Elizabeth's grandfather, another by her uncle, and a third 



72 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

by John Brown, who renders us the service of escorting our 
heroine across the ridge on bad nights, when she is obliged 
to be abroad, and occasionally performing other duties of 
kindness and courtesy, such as his supernumerary sort of 
character owes to useful people in the world who are their 
nearest neighbours. By the way, this was the only noble 
office that the poor fellow ever filled, and we ought to be 
thankful that he was good enough and good-for-nothing 
enough, to be always ready for the duty. Brown, though a 
married man, of about fifty-five, is Elizabeth's only beau, but 
we may accompany her in imagination to her cottage home 
in the glen. The footpath lies straight up the hillside, leav- 
ing the winding wagon road abruptly and plunging directly 
into the thick bushes. A sharp struggle with the steepness, 
a brisk squabble with the loose stones which slip and tumble 
under the foothold, and we have gained the flat rock that 
caps the ascent. But it affords no outlook. The broad 
limbed chesnuts, scrub oaks, and undergrowth of bushes, hide 
everything but patches of the sky, and glimpses of the tree 
tops on the mountain range before us. Besides, we are on 
the way to Tommy Barton's, and there is nothing in our 
search that matches well with grand scenery and pretty 
landscapes. We must get down the rugged pathway, with 
our attention sharply employed upon our footsteps, and when 
the feat is well accomplished, we are on the margin of the 
, little rivulet that unrolls like a silver ribbon between the hills. 
Stepping daintily upon the plank, that swings and dips till the 
surface of the water steadies it, we reach the worm fence of 
the little meadow, which is crossed by a stile, made rudely 
enough of an upping-block on one side, and a stump upon the 
other. The cabin sits fifty yards before us upon a natural 
terrace ; a rocky bluff rises rapidly behind it, like a giant 
stairway to climb the mountain, which swells away into the 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 73 

tnid-heaven, so steep and barren that it seems built there to 
dyke out the northern storm waves. This cabin is a rude, 
unshapely piece of architecture. Originally it was a square 
pen, built of unhewn logs, about a foot in diameter and 
twenty-five in length, but, as the necessity for room increased 
with an increasing family, additions of similar log pens were 
piled up, at either end, until it stood stretched out in line ; 
three houses made one by cutting out the end walls of the 
first one, and throwing all the rooms into one great hall, 
which, without partition, blinds or curtains to divide them, 
served for kitchen, dining room and bed chamber for the old 
folks, and cubbies for half-a-dozen of the young ones, besides 
room for a hand loom and its appurtenances, in the corner 
farthest from the kitchen end of the building. A half story 
above this long range of rooms, accessible by a ladder instead 
of stairway, with a clapboard roof for ceiling, and divided 
into rooms by drop curtains of heavy home made canvas. 
afforded the girls a dormitory at one end and the oldest boys 
a like accommodation at the other. The family, all told, 
reached the round number of fourteen children, of whom 
Elizabeth, the eldest, was about twenty-two, and the young- 
est child four years old at the date of our story. 

The mother was one of those indistinct nobodies who usu- 
ally figure at the head of such a regiment of children, but the 
father was an Irishman, and had as much of that in him as 
would serve to "set up twice as many heirs," as the saying 
is, "in extravagance." He was one of the Bartons of the 
Xorth, and according to his own account, " of a dacent fami- 
ly that lived on their own land at home, and niver a one of 
the name was iver known to be a Papist." Tommy's zeal 
for the true faith, it was easy enough to perceive, was the 
old grudge, and only another phase of his pride of caste and 
boast of blood. He was religious, of course, or he might as 

4 



14 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

well have been born anywhere else as in the County Antrim. 
A dozen years before, he had been a member of the society 
that worshipped at the schoolhouse, — that sort of a member 
that can neither be kept in nor out of the Church 
but by the severest measures and the hardest fighting. 
Tommy left the brotherhood but two choices — either to put 
him out, or to blow themselves up. Accordingly, they expel- 
led him on sundry charges, among which were hard swearing, 
occasional intoxication, and perpetual contumacy. The injury 
of this expulsion was nothing, in the account that Tommy 
opened with them for it ; his pride fed fat upon his injuries ; 
everything, everybody, injured him. In fact, he had all his 
consequence in his injuries. Their greatness served to mea- 
sure the magnitude of his rights and were welcome to his 
magnanimity ; but the insult was too much for one of the 
Barton family to bear. Tommy was eloquent by birthright, 
but, unhappily, be was never genial except when he was 
boring some gentleman in good broadcloth with the proofs 
and indications, historical and fanciful, of his family's gen- 
tility. Ill luck and ill treatment, ill conduct and ill condi- 
tions (Tommy never had any other sort of either) had curdled 
the wit and humour inherent in his blood, and kept it for ever 
boiling and bubbling with fretfulness and passion. Yet, 
queer, crazy, and absurd as was the mixture in this proud, 
weak, worthless, high-spirited old man, Elizabeth derived, it 
seems to me, her steady nobleness from his impulsive aspira- 
tions, her fine enthusiasm from his wild fire, and her generosity 
from his Irish pride. 

The chemistry of matter knows how to convert the elements 
of charcoal into diamond ; and the modifying forces of the 
vital laws are equally adequate to all the difference between 
this foolish old father and his noble daughter. There was 
that in him which, by looking for it, one could see might, by 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 75 

better mingling and steadier drift, be made to answer the 
best uses and highest ends ; but, by an accident or jog in the 
settling, had produced instead — an Irishman, — which, I take 
it, as s> rule, is nearer to a natural nobleman and yet further 
from a reasonable being than any other variety of the human 
race. 

The difference in results between these two persons was so 
great that they never actually touched, even at the borders ; 
yet an intrinsic resemblance could be traced in every fibre of 
their respective constitutions. 

Tommy could get tipsy occasionally, talk nonsense mixed 
up with poetry any time, and brag like a jockey about every : 
thing that in any way concerned him. He was, moreover, 
incapable in business, unsteady in labor, and given to substi- 
tute the sentiment of duty for its practice, and to content 
himself with fine speeches in place of noble actions ; and all 
without a shade of hypocrisy, for he was in fact so proud of 
what he was, and so ready with reasons and apologies for all 
that he was not, that he needed no pretences. He was not 
profligate, unprincipled, or insensible to right ; he was only 
an Irishman ; and that hindered him from being either worse 
or better. The raw elements of every human excellence were 
in him in rich abundance, and in great confusion too : but in 
Elizabeth they had crystallized into the most efficient forms 
and most perfect beauty ; for all of texture that was want- 
ing in her paternal blood was supplied to her by her maternal 
grandfather who was an unmitigated Scotchman. 

With his beggar's complement of children, and general 
unthriftiness of character, Tommy was, of course, poor to the 
very verge of destitution. He had grown steady — that is, 
sober — lately, and he was not lazy ; but it was as much 
because his health had failed, and age was beginning to stiffen 
the machinery, as from any principle, that he was amending 



76 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

in his habits. It must be allowed, also, that he was feeling 
Elizabeth's influence with steadily increasing force. There 
was dignity with its incident authority in her deportment ; 
not of the imposing kind, nor by any means directly and dis- 
tinctly shown and felt ; it was more like that energy of 
gentleness which shapes the bone to the brain's steady pres- 
sure, the framework of the chest to the resiliency of the lungs 
and heart, the vital power that in the tenderest flower stalk 
pierces and mellows to conformity the hardest clod. 

The very poor are unapt to respect each other, or to 
regard, amid the rude familiarities of their daily intercourse, 
the noblest qualities. Nor, indeed, is it easy for them to 
discover them in the coarse dress of circumstances which 
poverty imposes. Ay ! it is the bitterest of poverty's ten 
thousand curses, that it denies the conditions of decorous 
association and refining intercourse ; that it prevents that 
discipline which habitual proprieties of demeanor only can 
enforce, and destroys all pure and healthful self-respect by 
the undignified and indelicate personal relations which it 
compels. And it is uttering a volume of commendation in 
a word, when I say that Elizabeth had conquered her father's 
refractoriness, and secured from him a deference which almost 
inverted the Irish order of domestic life. 

Five years before, when she attached herself to the church, 
the very church which had expelled him, he drove her with 
violence from the house, with as great indignation as if she 
had stained his name and honor with the deepest shame. A 
weary, wretched year she endured the exile, earning her 
support by labors, lighter, indeed, upon her hands than the 
tasks which she performed at home, but heavier upon her 
heart ; for she could do nothing for that large family 
that needed her now every day, more and more, in every 
office which a woman only can fulfil to a household of small 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 77 

children in great need. The mother was what the country 
people called a " doless creature/ 7 and the sister next in age 
to Elizabeth was delicate in health and too feeble in char- 
acter for the service. The weight that lay heaviest upon 
her heart was half a dozen of little sisters, as beautiful as 
birds, wanting all things, and wanting, most of all things, 
the governance and culture of an elder sister's nursing love 
and controlling prudence. They were crowded there together 
like a herd of orphans in an almshouse, exposed to their 
father's petulance and to each other's selfishness and tem- 
pers, and suffering many things besides, which childhood 
cannot suffer without having the very fountains of its life 
poisoned by the bitter deprivations ; and all without the 
mediation of that wise, good heart which was aching in its 
exile to render its self-sacrificing services. There were fret- 
tings and fightings there, tears and turmoils, injuries inflicted 
and endured, and with all, and above ail, the absence every 
hour felt, by the hourly recurring need, of the ministering 
angel of the household. Especially through the long, 
gloomy winter, the days, and weeks, and months wore 
wearily away in that wretched cabin. All suffered the pen- 
alty of the father's pride, but none so keenly as himself, for 
to him it brought all the privation, with the sin and folly 
added. But he would not yield to the constraint he felt 
and the necessities he witnessed, because it would have been 
in such circumstances, not a reconciliation, but a surrender ; 
and, the refractory old fool would dash the tears out of his 
eyes, with the pretence that it was passion, and not sorrow 
that moved them, and with an oath refuse her permission to 
return. At last, when things had become intolerable, half 
a dozen children and the mother sick, the whole household 
suffering, and the father at his wit's end, she bravely forced 
her way into the wretched hovel. It required a little more 



78 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

resolution than the old man could muster to make resistance, 
and he silently and sullenly submitted. It was enough ; she 
was installed again, and she had returned strong in purpose 
and very rich in resources for the exigency. 

A year's experience, a larger sphere of thought and 
broader observation, had done wonders upon her earnest 
character. It seemed natural enough that she should be a 
little strange for a few days after her return ; moreover, she 
was still under ban, though the banishment was remitted ; 
and these things together served to explain her difference of 
manner and general demeanor to her father and old familiars, 
and to protect her peculiarity from impertinent remark. 

She left them before her religious enthusiasm had time 
and opportunity to settle into form and take the habitual 
direction of her conduct. Residence among strangers, with 
its modicum of leisure and privacy, had invested her with 
her proper individualism ; and the severe discipline of mind 
and feeling undergone, had worked its permanent results 
into the texture of her mental constitution, which was 
remarkable at once for its aptness and tenacity. The con- 
trolling quality of Elizabeth's mind was, very plainly, in its 
intense religious devotedness, which, in her not only sublimed, 
but strengthened her natural affections, held them well and 
wisely to their office, and gave to the simplest duty which 
had anything of sacrifice in it, the tone and determination of 
a sacred obligation. 

Her ideal of a religious life is called, in the phrase of her 
church creed, sanctification, perfect love, or Christian perfec- 
tion. This conception was her standard. The instant aspi- 
rations of her heart were for angel purity and excellence. 
Her understanding, in its enthusiasm, rejected the logical 
manceuvering by which the requirements of the highest law 
are reconciled to habitual delinquencies of life ; nay, she felt 



ELIZABETH BARTON. f9 

weakness itself like a crime. Her meekness bore without 
apology the burden of her offences ; and self-justification on 
the ground of natural infirmity of nature, would have felt 
to her the very boldness of an appeal from the law of con- 
duct prescribed for her by her Divine Father. The soul 
held in such a frame, grew and gushed like the flowers and 
fountains under the kindliest influences of heaven. In the 
calm of her holy reveries, blessing lay like dew upon her 
affections, and in its exultant movement, the divine presence 
flooded her whole being with its light and life, like a sun- 
burst on a mountain top. It needed only a clear insight to 
perceive that her essential life was " hid with Christ in God f 
that there was a constant rapture in the soul under that 
tranquillity of the senses — a fullness of the diviner life sus- 
taining a level of perpetual calmness on the surface, which 
the forces of the outward and accidental had no power to 
disturb. This supremacy of the central took nothing from 
the wonted energy of the loves she owed to the world with- 
out ; it rather adjusted, steadied, and supplied them with a 
recreating strength, a constant freshness and untiring 
patience. If her faith and fervor bordered on fanaticism in 
sentiment, they nevertheless, in all the verities of use, flowed 
like life blood through her moral system, feeding with vital 
force all the faculties which perform the benign offices of love 
and duty. A deep peace ruled her spirit and wove its quiet 
into all the solicitudes which she sustained for others, and 
holy rest within compensated and repaired the waste of toil 
without. 

She held herself aloof from the coarse companionship 
around her without offence, for it was seen that she had no 
leisure for idle courtesies ; and the restraints which occupa- 
tion would not account for, were credited to her devotional 
habits. Besides, however strange it may seem, with all her 



80 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

dignity, beauty and efficiency, she was not especially attrac- 
tive to the undiscerning boors about her. Her riddle was 
quite beyond their reading ; and her charms were not in 
direct array to their apprehensions ; for, in all its propor- 
tions, that saying of the apostle has accurate application, 
that " spiritual things are spiritually discerned," and not 
otherwise. She was quiet constitutionally, more so still by 
the high occupation of her thoughts ; and she was, besides, 
really not eloquent in words, nor copiously furnished with 
thoughts and utterance for conversational uses. Her early 
education had been sadly neglected by that improvident 
father of hers ; her present opportunities for study were 
absolutely nothing, and her mental activities were now, on 
account of their nature as well as of necessity, almost wholly 
introverted. Indeed, she was one of those instances of ade- 
quateness for the severest trials and highest duties, ay, for 
the nobles styles of life, where the intellect is only moderate, 
but the harmony and richness of the moral nature supplies 
it with inspiration, giving it range and strength and certi- 
tude, quite beyond its own independent capabilities. Three 
centuries ago, there were peers of England who could neither 
read nor write ; and the highest fame in all the ample round 
of historic greatness belongs to a man, who, in speculative 
philosophy and general literature was neither proficient nor 
remarkable for his capability. 

Elizabeth knew everything that her life demanded, though 
she had learned so little. She could work miracles in the 
domestic economy of that burdensome household. She knew 
how to rule without usurpation, where authority rather 
required her to obey ; and the younger inmates, refractory 
to all other force, yielded to the charm of her goodness and 
the mixture of gentleness, steadiness and address which she 
had the grace and patience to employ. A just analysis of 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 81 

her agency in that family would make an excellent treatise 
upon domestic conduct, though she would probably have 
been both silent and incapable in a discussion of the princi- 
ples and policy of her system. 

Her mind and feelings, more than any other that I ever 
knew, found their manifestation in action, duty, practice ; 
and less in utterance and social demonstration. Her reserve, 
indeed, seemed like an incapacity, and its rigidness scarcely 
escaped the censure of her kindest friends. Nothing could 
draw her from that everlasting loom except some household 
duty. No visit paid there seemed to include her in its 
courtesies or idleness. If a direct question interrupted the 
flying shuttle and her hand paused a moment in its office, it 
was only for the interval required by the shortest answer 
that could be made in kindness and cordiality. The thread 
of her web resumed its race as quickly as the urgency of the 
interrogation would allow, and her patience under persecut- 
ing complaisance was even equal to her perseverance ; but, 
few as there were who understood it, or the proprieties 
which it exacted, there were still fewer who could raise the 
hardihood to test her forbearance very severely. Her steady 
manner settled it without appeal, for it really gave no offence 
and left no dissatisfaction. She was busy with a warrant, 
and the visitor always made her apology so as to leave the 
pleasure of the call marred by no feeling but the sense of 
his own loss. 

I have seen but few women who sat as well at the piano, 
and when she had a fine linen web in the loom, and the 
weather allowed of open doors, clear air and summer neat- 
ness in the array of the cabin furniture, nothing could be 
more becoming than her occupation. 

It was not monotonous, for her face was full of thought- 

4* 



82 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

ful light and changeful feeling. Her perfect gracefulness of 
motion and simple elegance of form, her strength and quiet 
beauty, which, without challenging admiration, gave deep, 
pure pleasure, preserved an air of naturalness to the picture 
which allowed it to glide unquestioned into the spectator's 
feelings. 

Thus I found her and her surroundings when I called 
occasionally as a visitor ; but, when I went professionally to 
see the children in their little illnesses, difficult as order was 
in such circumstances, the whole feeling of the scene was 
changed by the effect of her changed attitude. She stood 
foremost then, the mind that took direction of affairs ; her 
manner intimating the highest qualities, and her whole action 
impressing me with the feeling, that she was my equal and 
something more, except in my professional office. In a 
thousand women I have met none whose mental sympathies 
and intuitions felt firmer and broader than did that rustic 
girl's. 

After a year's occasional intercourse, but more than occa- 
sional interest in her, the relentless severity of her toil and 
the unrelaxing strain of her mental excitation, conspiring 
with the recurrence of the epidemic season and an unusually 
wet autumn, broke down her strength, and I was summoned 
to her bedside, by her faithful old friend and servant, Brown, 
with a rap on the window of my shanty, I know not how 
long after midnight. 

" Doctor, you're wanted badly at Tommy Barton's. Eli- 
zabeth is down, I'm afeared with the fever ; and she wouldn't 
let me trouble you till, I doubt, we've waited almost too 
long ; but, I hope not." 

" Why Brown, is that you ? Are you afoot ? It must 
be pitch dark on the ridge just now." 



E L I Z A B E T H B A B X N . 83 

" Yes ; I had no horse ; and I'd rather walk such a night 
as this than ride, anyhow. I don't know how you'll get 
along in the woods, Doctor !" 

" Don't bother your brains about that, Brown. Old 
Barney will find his way across the ridge for me, as soon as 
I turn him into the track, by the sense he has in his toe- 
nails, if it is as dark as Egypt. There is a good fire in my 
office ; you can find a plank in the floor soft enough for you 
to sleep on, and you may eat my breakfast for me in the 
morning, and get home at your leisure by daylight. " 

In ten minutes I was mounted, and Barney and I were 
swinging down the valley road, with such confidence and 
alacrity as nothing animal or human can feel, in the deep 
darkness of a starless night, except a country physician and 
his horse. But, I must not indulge in the rehearsal of a 
night ride along the mountain foot, the frequent fording of 
the valley stream, and the thick palpable blackness of the 
ridge before me. What of it ? My faithful horse had the 
strength of a steam engine, and the elastic action of a leo- 
pard. Ah ! we understood each other perfectly ; and, 
while I adjusted myself in the saddle and he took in his first 
long breath to ease the girths and prepare for his first play- 
ful spring, I could feel that his heart swelled to welcome the 
sympathetic pressure of my knees. And when in the silence 
and vastness of the night I danced in the stirrups for very 
joy, the little difficulties and shadowy dangers of the path- 
way served only to frame in the dream, and define it into fact 
and give its enjoyment firmer reality and finer edgedness. 
Why, bless your cautious indolence, I was but twenty-two and 
had not lost a single patient in six months' full practice ! 
I was in love with nature and all the world just then ; for 1 
had convalesced from my last attack, with the trouble all 
gone and the tenderness all left, sweet and fresh ; and was 



#4 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

]*ust hovering on the verge of another and deeper passion, 
without exactly knowing or fearing it. So, hurrah for the 
night, the mountains, and the sky of heaven that I touch 
now in the vibrations of these stooping clouds ! 

"Ho, Barney ! step a little gingerly; my hat is down, 
but it wasn't your fault, my fine fellow; and that blow 
of the bough in the teeth closes the conversation with all out- 
of-doors for the rest of the ride." And so, settling into the 
proprieties of the occasion, I ride a little more warily and 
soon reach the rivulet, find a hitching-place for my horse 
near the stile, and the cabin door is reached with a spring 
or two by the light flashing from all its windows and show- 
ing the agitation of its inmates. * * * * 

Ay, fever it is, and a ferocious one. It has set in with 
such a storm of general disturbance, that my best judgment 
cannot predict the result. I see it all, all but the issue. A 
long, desperate struggle — weeks of battle between this vig- 
orous life-force and the avenger of the much wronged organ- 
ism. Elizabeth ! the very glory of thy beauty is upon thee 
now. Smitten, as the swooping mountain wind dashes down 
upon a sleeping valley lake, arousing its billows into answer- 
ing madness ; and with the terrors of the storm, too, this 
liberated life has come ; for there is desolation in the wake 
of all its grand commotion ! Dreary, dismal, chill and hope- 
less, the winter that may follow ; and the flowers of the 
coming spring — how sad, in their fresh gaiety, will they 
bloom to me, if they shed their sweetness on thy grave ! 

Such were my sensations under the first shock of the 
threatening symptoms. The flushed cheek and flashing eye ; 
the nervous energy, bordering upon delirium ; the throbbing, 
wiry pulse and burning heat, crisping over all that snowy 
purity of complexion — all these arrayed against the roused 
resistance of that noble constitution — unfolded like a battle- 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 85 

chart to my startled apprehension. And the grouping of 
the anxious family, which always has its force in medical 
prognosis ; the father, with his look of fear and h elplessness, 
breaking into tears and tenderness, so unusual with him ; 
the mother, looking that complete break-down wretchedness 
which she felt ; Mary, busying herself with nursing duties, 
which she is inventing to crowd out the thickening thoughts 
of danger ; and the children, with eager alarm in their little 
faces, peeping from under cover in every corner that could 
command my countenance, to read their hopes and fears in 
its expression ! How electrical the focus of such burning 
eyes, the centre of such whirling thoughts, becomes ! and 
how much depends, to the patient, family and physician 
upon the impressions of that first fronting with the malady ! 
Its intensity must be broken by a movement of professional 
authority, and hearts get relief in the activity of the hands, 
or mischief will follow that cannot be repaired. 

" Bring me some water, Mary, fresh from the spring — a 
large bowl full and a thick towel for her pillow. We must 
sponge her head and hands till the excessive heat is well 
reduced ; and, Mary, bring her a tumbler, lipping full, to 
drink, too." 

" Oh, thank you, bless you, Doctor ; Pm burning with 
this thirst and fever ! All day long the water in the spring- 
run has been rippling just beyond my reach — the sound of 
its dropping falls like blows upon my ear ; it boils upon my 
hot tongue, and the steam of it fills and seethes my very 
brain. It runs away between my spread fingers when I try 
to dip it up, and it bursts out into flame as soon as it touches 
my hot lips. Oh, give me some cool, fresh, sweet water, and 
let me rest, for I'm so weary ; and — and — I have so much 
to do when I waken." 

11 The trouble on her mind is for us, as it always is," 



86 



ELIZABETH BARTON 



groaned out the father ; "and she's just killed with labor. 
I wish it was myself that was lying there, and as well pre, 
pared, for I'm no use now, and she'll be hard to spare in 
this desolate family. She has kept us together with hard 
struggling, many a long day, and I thought she would be 
spared to us and then we would hardly want anything else 
in life. Must we lose her, Doctor, dear, do you think V 7 

11 Lose her ! No, it is not possible. It is not in the har- 
mony of things. We love her as well, and need her more 
than the angels do ; and we'll hold her here with a heart- 
strength that will not fail us. Fear nothing, believe and 
wait." 

My own prophecy did but little to assure me ; but fear 
answered as well when hope failed, and without bating a jot 
of effort I gave her such skill of medicine and nursing as 
head and heart could furnish for nineteen days and nights ; 
doing double duty with half rest, in order to distribute even 
justice to my other patients, and watch for the changes that 
I feared in her case. How still my heart stood at that cot- 
tage door-step, when I made my visits in the night, while I 
paused to catch by the well-known signs of the sick room, 
how the patient was supposed to be by her attendants, 
before the courage could be summoned to meet the facts in 
all their certainty. And when, day after day, the same 
changeless stapor hung upon her brain, the same hot pesti- 
lence rioted through her frame, till she lay a wreck upon 
the fever surges that were slowly wasting her, — oh, what 
questionings of my own competency, what doubtfulness of my 
profession's truth and usefulness, what prayer and wrestling 
with the Power that held the issues of life, for deliverance 
from the impending danger ! 

At last, one fine November morning, when faith and hope, 
and even affection, had worn weak by their own exhausting 



E L I Z A B E T PI BARTON. '87 

tension, and the suspense, grown into a habit, held our 
hearts in a mechanical, steady stupor, suddenly the clouds 
broke, and the heavens and earth smiled out with joy again, 
like the waking of a summer morning after rain. The crisis 
was past, and she was given back to us, and we sat down 
together like children, and played with our recovered bless- 
ing, as with a new toy given by a loving parent on the 
morning of a holiday. 

Critical illnesses often work other changes in the patient 
besides the various physical phases of their progress — 
changes that become permanent in the habits of feeling and 
character of thought. These discovered themselves in Eliza- 
beth during her convalescence by a happy consciousness of 
all the interest that we felt, and a gaily frank acceptance of 
the services w r hich we rendered her. No weight of work and 
duty lay heavy upon her heart now, and her affections flowed 
out rich, genial and generous, without check or censure from 
an over severe sanctity of spirit. Affectionate tenderness, 
flowing in upon her for the first time in her hard life, had its 
natural effect ; her mental tension and strictly ruled emo- 
tions lost their strained resistance under the influx of loving 
kindness. The rigid habitude of devotedness and self-sacri- 
fice was relaxed by bodily feebleness, and her long checked 
affections opened broad and bright, like the flowers of a late 
spring in the first full flood of sunshine. 

It was about the third day after the happy turn, when 
the hope of her recovery felt well assured, that I was first 
impressed with these thoughts about her. Mary had suc- 
ceeded in thoroughly dressing her luxuriant hair ; the bed, 
made up in the tone of the new hopefulness, was snowy 
w T hite in its array of fine domestic linen, manufactured by 
Elizabeth's own hands the year before ; and a pink gingham 
bed-gown, which I recognized as an old acquaintance doing 



88 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

a new duty, lent its delicately relieving tints to the exquisite 
fairness and fineness of her pure complexion, still too pale 
from her recent illness. The windows were open to the 
genial air, the sunlight lay mellow upon her pillow, and a 
smile of holy sweetness played upon her face. We stood in 
the conscious communion of her inmost life, and saw the 
real as in a vision, and felt the true as it were a dream* 
The imagination had there materials for its brightest fanta- 
sies ; but there was a soul within, and a simplicity of fact 
beneath this transfigured life, that might stand the ordeal 
of the hardest baked philosophy. I marked the fact that 
she had new first awakened to the full consciousness of her 
own loveliness. Its proper joy gave light to her eye and 
its melody to her voice that morning, just as the breezes, 
birds and rivulets breathed, and sang, and smiled out the 
gladness and glory of their own beauty. The severe 
restraints of her girlhood, which had garnered while they 
repressed her life's natural outflow, now gave way under the 
new impulse. The reverent tenderness of those whom she 
most loved had found occasion in her illness for such manifesta- 
tion, that she could feel, without the abatement of self- 
reproof, her own real worth and a divine blessing in the 
sense of it. It rested like a crown upon her natural noble- 
ness, converting that cottage into a very presence-chamber, 
and the bed and beauty which rested on it seemed an altar 
with its angel. It came to me like a religion* and lent a 
lasting beauty to my life — an abiding sense of the sacred- 
ness of pure womanhood. 

That winter I had devoted to the completion of my colle- 
giate term of study. Three precious weeks of the session 
had gone by while I lingered with Elizabeth ; for I could not 
leave her till her health was certainly reestablished ; and I 
may, perhaps, as well confess that I was in no special hurry 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 89 

to take my own discharge. After all, it was only one of 
the professors whom I cared very much about losing for the 
first month of the course, and so I took a little more time 
than in strictness might have sufficed for preparation for 
departure. 

Returning from the County town one evening, two days 
before the morning fixed for leaving for the city, a furious 
storm of wind and rain drove me for shelter into the farm- 
house of a friend and sometime patient, where I was delighted 
to find the Rev. Mr. Ashleigh staying for the night. He 
had been absent from the circuit for a month or more, on a 
visit home. His brother had died, and left him guardian of 
two young children, whose care had a little while detained 
him. His greetings were unusually earnest and impressive ; 
they made me know that he had something to say to me in 
trust, or that I could do something for him. ■ We had not 
been friends before, exactly, but near enough to it to become 
so through the sympathies of the first scrape that either of 
us might fall into. A private interview was impossible, for 
the rain kept us in the house, and the family wouldn't miss 
a word of the conversation of the Preacher and Doctor, or 
leave us a moment alone, for the world. They were too 
polite and respectful for that ! And as it rained on severely 
till nearly bedtime I agreed to stay with them. 

That night we occupied the same bed. Two hours, full, 
he talked, as I felt, about every thing but the matter on 
hand, until I grew weary, and withal solicitous to know what 
exactly was the matter with the fellow. At midnight the 
sky cleared and a bright moon burst gloriously out; its light 
fell full upon my face through the window : I marked it, and 
turning toward him, jocularly said : 

" Brother George, did you ever walk out alone, on a fine 



90 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

night, to talk to the moon, and when you met her face to 
face, didn't know what to say to her, eh ?" 

His whole manner changed ; his fine face filled full of high 
emotion ; he rose upon one elbow and laid his other hand 
upon my heart, thrilling with the appealing meaning of its 
touch, and looking steadily and largely into my eyes, he 
said, slowly and impressively : 

" Doctor, do you know Elizabeth Barton ?" 

His look held the question where his words had put it, with 
such impressment, that I lay still under its imposing earnest- 
ness till it was hard to make my answer fittingly. My mind 
manoeuvered for a moment or two for an escape, but it 
wouldn't do ; " the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but 
the truth w was the demand, and in all plainness it rose spon- 
taneously, and I could only touch it as it passed my lips, 
with a relieving shade of humor. 

"Know her ! my dear fellow, know her ! why, I don't 
know anybody else." 

He fell back upon his pillow, as if he had fainted. This 
brought me to my elbow, to gaze in turn into his face. He 
hid it with his hand and whispered slowly : "Wait a moment 
and I'll tell you." 

" That's you," said I ; " Unbuckle your budget freely, and 
let me look over your assortment. I'm ready for anything 
that you have on hand; especially, anything about Elizabeth." 

My gaiety relieved him ; and rising again, quite as earnest, 
but not quite so awful as before, he said in tones as mellow 
as pity for himself could make them, 

"Doctor, I love that girl to desperation." 

" Whew ! whew ! " 

11 Hear me, Doctor, do hear me ; I know what I'm saying. 
It is true as heaven, it is the only live truth left in me. I 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 91 

love her as never man loved a woman before. What shall I 
do?" 

" Do — do — you superlative simpleton ! why, get up this 
moment, go saddle your horse, gallop over the ridge, kick 
the door down, throw yourself at her feet, tell her you love 
her, with your face set to the same expression that you have 
told me : and if she don't accept you on the spot, take your 
boarding, or fall sick and stay till she does. Now my poor 
fellow, lie down and take a good cry, and you'll feel better. 
I'll sit up with you till the crisis is past. There — there — on 
your own side, please ! you're smothering me ! and more 
than that, Toby Myers will hear you bawling out ; I heard 
him turn in his bed just now ; he'll be up here directly, if you 
don't behave, and then I'll have to tell some capital lie for 
you, about the nightmare, to account for this blubbering. 
Come, do behave yourself, will you ? n 

In a few moments he reined up and carried himself steadily, 
and- then he told me how he had been impressed by his first 
sight of her ; how he kept thinking about it ; how he preached 
an entire sermon to her, soon afterwards, and how, after a 
little while, he could scarcely preach at all, because she was 
present with her earnest eyes fixed so steadily and coolly on 
him ; how he called as often as he could invent occasions at 
her father's ; and how incessantly that everlasting loom went 
on with its work ; how many efforts he had made to gain 
some conversation with her; and how completely he was 
always baffled by her busy occupation, and her reserved demea- 
nor, until he felt worried out of his life with disappointment 
and uncertainty. 

" Uncertainty," said I, " what about ? " 

"What about !" he answered sharply, almost angrily; 
" what about ! why, Doctor, what do I know about her ? 
Can she read and write ? I'm hardly sure that she can talk. 



92 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

Do you know that I am a gentleman ; or must I tell you ? 
And more than that, I am not quite a fool either. My family 
is fashionable ; I am wealthy, — and I cannot marry an uned- 
ucated wife, — a woman that I must blush for, till I grow 
ashamed even to love her. Oh Lord ! what shall I do ? " 

" Do ! I'll tell you what to do. Just hold your tongue 
till you hear me, and then hold it afterwards till you tell your 
story to Elizabeth and hear what she has to say : for you 
have not wit enough now to take care of yourself." 

u That's not very hard to say, I reckon, for it hasn't to be 
felt first," was his reply. Then pausing for five minutes, he 
added slowly, and as he thought, very resolutely, " I'll do 
nothing more about it. I must go home again in January to 
attend to business, and (here he drew the clothes tight about 
his shoulders like a man determined to sleep) I'll not be sent 
back to this penitentiary circuit again, I suppose ; so, if I 
can forget her, she is dropt, that's all. But, if the good Lord 
thinks otherwise, why, I suppose it will be brought about 
somehow. Let me see — you start for the city in a day or 
two. Of course, you think it safe to leave her. And, maybe 
I shall never see either of you again. God bless you, Doctor, 
I'm glad and thankful that you are her friend." 

Another long silence, and he turned up upon his elbow 
again. " See here, my dear brother Doctor : you are in love 
with Miss M. Now, I don't ask your confidence — I don't 
want it ; but tell me just one thing. If you marry Miss M., 
and I were to marry Elizabeth, would your wife visit mine, 
there in that old cabin, among those looms and pots and 
rickety old chairs, and, I don't know what all ? " 

This brought me to my elbow decidedly ; and, thrusting 
him down upon his pillow, and laying my shut fist upon his 
breast, instead of an oath, I answered him with a ring of the 
real metal of my meaning in every word : "If she wouldn't, 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 93 

ehe shouldn't live with me, that's all ; — so please don't make 
a special fool of yourself." 

The poor fellow's eye moistened 7 his face softened into a 
happy smile, and laying his open palms upon my temples, he 
whispered "The good Lord bless you;" detaining every 
word as it passed his lips, to give it all the earnest tenderness 
that was welling up from his full heart. 

The next morning, I inferred that he had slept as I did ; 
he looked so fresh and happy. I waited for breakfast for the 
sake of his company homeward, and I noticed that Mrs. 
Myers mellowed her voice and looked more womanly than 
usual when she spoke to him at the table. Something had 
turned up within him that telegraphed itself to her instincts, 
and made him beautiful exceedingly that morning. I knew 
it, — he had got his own consent, and given free wing to his 
idolatry ; he had, in a sense committed himself to Elizabeth 
by opening his heart to her friend, and the poor fellow of 
yesterday was rich now in the unchecked overflowing of his 
own soul. 

But, wasn't I fidgety and foolish ; didn't I almost tell 
something that nobody could understand, when next day I 
visited Elizabeth ? Wasn't I provoked that she wouldn't 
know she was queen of a new found world, and wouldn't echo 
all my exultations about — nothing at all, when it came to be 
stated in clear terms ? And didn't I nearly swear her to a 
promise not to work that winter in my absence, but read and 
write, and visit my sweetheart and her friends ; and get well 
and strong against the next spring, when I should return to 
set her free from my authority ? Moreover, wasn't I so glad 
of everything, and so full of robust rejoicing that I rudely stole 
a kiss, and felt particularly awkward when I discovered that 
I could have had it willingly, and that much the better, in the 
presence of the whole world ? And — and — then I turned 



94 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

away as a tear of gratitude and blessing glistened in her eye, 
blurring the last look she should have of me for many months, 
with all the shadow of life's risks thrown over the prospective 
absence. I had my reward ; I was paid for all that I had 
done and suffered in one moment — I stood clear in the appre- 
hension of one pure, noble soul ; the angel-life within me was 
stirred and realized in her recognition, and I knew again that 
the divine is true, and that the highest and brightest is the 
most real. But the conditions of the outward life were upon 
me ; devotional joy quickly resolved itself into gladness of 
nerve and heart, and Barney wondered what was the matter 
with me, I thought, by his plunging and blowing before he 
had climbed to the top of the rough ridge. By the time he 
got into my secret, as usual, I was quiet, and rational, and 
orderly again. A horse may bear a burden that will lift his 
service into the fellowship of a grateful sympathy. Poor 
fellow, he soothed me in many a moody hour ; he understood 
me, — and I love his memory now. 

By this time my readers are beginning to like me, I fear, 
and in that proportion, to withdraw their interest from the 
principals of my story. I will indulge the generous sentiment 
with a word only. My letters came to me during the session 
to the very hour. I found them every Saturday morning 
upon my plate at the breakfast table, where my good old 
landlady persisted in placing them, to have the pleasure of 
the explosion, which I could not learn to master when I found 
them with the right post-mark and image on the seal. So 
the studies at the college and the pretty girls at my board- 
ing house did me no mischief, and I got along like a young 
bear, or a man with a wheelbarrow — my troubles all before 
me. The winter was a severe one, the snows deep, and the 
roads in the valley desperate ; and I heard scarcely anything 
about Elizabeth except that she was " doing well." 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 95 

Of all the days in the year, it was St. Patrick's day in the 
morning that I was awakened from the absorption ofrny 
own affairs to a renewed interest in the events of my story, 
by receiving a brief note from Elizabeth, inviting me to her 
wedding, and conveying Mr. Ashleigh's request that I would 
stand groomsman for him with my own sweetheart, who was 
to play bridesmaid to her. This was all tempting enough, 
but the session had not closed and it was impossible. I was 
obliged to do as the courtly Mr. Dapper did, when it suited 
his business to leave church before the service had com- 
menced, — send my "card with regrets" to the altar. 

The day after I arrived at home, I crossed the ridge by 
the old route to see the " new married pair." It may seem 
odd, but the thing did not feel quite so like a romance, now 
that it was settled and consummated, as it did the last time 
I travelled that same road. It was all over, like a ball or a 
battle, and the hopes and anxieties so interesting while the 
plot was opening, were replaced now by those common-place 
certainties, which belong alike to all new marriages, sharpen- 
ed and deepened, indeed, in this case, by the speculations of 
curiosity and the feelings of friendship which specially 
belonged to it. 

How it had been brought about was yet a secret to me : 
but the route has usually lost its chief interest by the time 
the rendezvous is reached. This feeling came down* upon me 
like mountain mist as I crossed the hill again, in circum- 
stances so much altered to all the parties involved in my 
story; and when I met the happy couple in the cabin, with 
all its furniture and conditions, and their own manner and 
relations, changed so greatly for the better ; and, especially 
Elizabeth, in a new attitude which severed the old relations 
and broke up the dependence upon myself, which had grown 
so familiar to me and so pleasant, I confess, my enthusiasm 



96 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

flattened out a little. There she was before me in full health, 
her face more beautiful even than ever, but of a different 
style of beauty; her rich chesnut hair had been shorn in her 
convalescence to prevent its loss, and was now confined by 
a cap that helped to mark the transition from the rustic 
maiden to the married lady, with the most exquisite grace 
and fullness.^ Her new character, with all its claims finely 
asserted, sat upon her as easy as if she had been "to the 
manner born ; n and I felt the improvement, but I felt the 
difference, too, and I believe I checked my first greeting in 
mid-volley and changed it somewhat sharply into the propri- 
eties of the new order of affairs. Instead of the capers and 
confidences that I had promised myself in the consummation, 
we conversed and then dined, actually dined, in that same 
old cabin, in a way that I thought none of us were exactly 
accustomed to. The fashion of it wasn't Philadelphia, nor 
was it Virginia, and I'm sure it was not any nearer Tommy 
Barton's style than it was to either of the others. It was 
a sort of compromise of the three, and so an immense improve- 
ment upon the past, but without its natural relish. I didn't 
quite want the old order restored again, but — I missed it. 
Could I have been a little mean and selfish, because, with 
aS my real generosity, it was very pleasant to play patron 
to a very pretty girl, — because my occupation, with its 
pride and circumstance, was, like Othello's, gone — and, 
because, I was now of no real consequence to anybody there, 
and had only to be thanked and discharged from office, and, 
maybe, patronized besides, at the next turn affairs might 
take in our respective fortunes ? Heigh-ho ! it really is 
more blessed to give than to receive ; and, to be drifted into 
an eddy while the current that we rode so grandly on drifts 
by without us, makes it a little difficult to be liberal in sym- 
pathy with the dashing waves that leave us by the way. 



ELIZABETH BARTON. '97 

Bit. Ashleigh had been married almost a month, and he 
looked already as if it were quite a settled matter with him. 
He spoke to his wife as politely as if thirteen children, a 
couple of old folks, and a young gentleman with a sharp eye 
in his head, were not to be taken deep into the connubial 
confidences. I thought he did not fully believe in my pro- 
found respect for everybody and everything that surrounded 
him, and I was for a moment shabby enough to hope it was 
nothing worse even than that. But no matter — I had busi- 
ness over the ridge a little earlier and more urgent than I 
had thought of until now, and was about shaking hands 
respectfully, when Elizabeth, the Elizabeth of my memory, 
peeped out of the new Mrs. Ashleigh and asked me for a 
word in private, I gave her my hand, — we walked to the 
spring-head, a few paces from the house, and quickly found 
ourselves all right again. 

Turning to me, she said, " Doctor, I owe you, along with 
other things, a bill for medical attendance." 

" If you do, Elizabeth, you will have to owe it, along with 
the other things, and pay it in the same way." 

" Pm glad and thankful to have it so," she answered, in a 
manner full of beauty ; " I do not wish to owe you less, to 
take one grain's weight of my debt from my memory or affec- 
tions, but I thought it due to Mr. Ashleigh to renew it in 
his name if you would not let me pay it. We will be sepa- 
rated soon ; we may never meet again, and I wish all your 
recollections of me to be happy as they can be ; and I cheer- 
fully remain your debtor that the clink of money may not 
seem to cancel any bond between us. God bless you, 
Doctor !" 

She took my hand and stood for a moment in rapt devo- 
tion, as I had seen her before under trials and in triumphs, 
and I felt its influence, — its hallowing influence, — like a new 

5 



98 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

baptism. Then changing her whole manner, she said lightly, 
" Doctor, Pin very happy — it is all right, — I have not a 
word to say that you need to know. Your warmest wishes 
for me are more than fulfilled ; be sure of this. But, did 
you know that Cousin Nancy was not at our wedding V 

"No." 

" You must ask my husband for the reason. He will tell 
you — I cannot. There he is getting out his horse to go 
with you, I suppose. What a talk you will have ! I shall 
be along with you, in fancy, and overhear every word. Oh! 
I wouldn't miss your part of it for the world ; especially, 
the sight of your face, which I shall have by my own insight, 
in a place or two in the story that I know of. Good-bye. 
You will be with us to-morrow. We dine with Miss M — ." 

We were scarcely mounted when Ashleigh looked at me 
just as he did on the morning after our moonlight bed scene. 
Like his wife, he thought and felt much more than his face 
usually confessed, and, like her, when his heart opened, the 
revealment was full and absolute. The road was narrow; 
but we did not want a wide one. He seized my hand and 
gave me a look that began with a pleasant, cunning, self- 
congratulating meaning, which soon sobered down into 
deeply earnest feeling, then rose again into the tone of a gay 
triumph, and burst out finally into laughter which set every 
nerve in his body to dancing in its own gladness. 

There needed no introduction and there was no danger of 
impertinences in his story. He began naturally, just where 
I left him, and went on, only lightly now and gaily, with his 
difficulty of getting access to his sweetheart's presence. He 
tried every way but the right one, until, when there was no 
other left, he discovered that, and then his troubles were 
well over. He asked her to walk with him up the valley, 
having something to communicate, he said, which greatlv 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 99 

concerned himself ; anc 1 they were immediately on their way 
and out of earshot of all the world. He had learned the 
necessity of directness by the failure of all his little dodges, 
and he had crossed the Rubicon himself, and felt the over- 
ness of his position. His words were few but full. They 
needed no explanation, and they left no doubts. And when 
he had opened his heart, and emptied it utterly before her, 
he turned, and asked her if she could love him. She answered 
him with equal candor and directness : " Mr. Ashleigh, I do 
not love you. I have never thought of such a thing. I 
have esteemed you as a preacher ; and, as a man, too, when 
that point has presented itself, I have sufficiently admired 
you ; but I saw you were a man of good birth and gentle 
breeding, good talents and education, with the world open 
to you, by virtue of your social position, and, perhaps, 
wealth ; for even the signs of that were not all concealed 
under your careful modesty of manner. Am I right about 
your circumstances ?" said she, pausing for a reply. 

" Yes, Elizabeth," he answered, "I am what you would 
call rich." 

"Well," she resumed, "I knew all this ; and, if I had 
thought of giving you any other regards than such as became 
our church connection, the improbabilities would have checked 
me, but I did not. Mr. Ashleigh (reaching out her hand to 
him), I tell you truly, that I do not love you. It is a new 
feeling to me. Perhaps I do not very well understand it ; 
nor will you expect it to come like a ready answer to a short 
question." 

"Good! Good!" I shouted. "What a glorious girl! 
What a world of genius in her simple truthfulness ! What 
did you say to that, Ashleigh ?" 

11 Say to it ? just hold still and you shall hear. Of course, 
you can't guess ; for you didn't see her face, at that moment, 



100 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

nor read its meaning, as I did. Ah, my dear Doctor 1 it 
was worth living all one's lifetime and a better life than 
mine, to witness that transfiguration of perfect womanhood! 
I wonder if she is not sometimes literally inspired ! ' Well/ 
I answered : ' you do not love me, Elizabeth, but could you 
not V I waited long enough to read it all in her face, and 
then it came in words. 

11 ' Mr. Ashleigh, it is in my heart to love you, for you 
are very noble, as this world goes, more than noble, gener- 
ous, without a parallel. And, sir, I am what I am ; not 
unworthy of the love you offer me, nor incapable of return- 
ing it. I can marry you without a fear. Now, leave me, 
please ; I wish to be alone.' 

" And so did I," he added, musingly ; "it seemed as if 
eternity had opened to me ; and I wanted to be alone in the 
universe with my emotions." 

A long pause followed, which I felt, for his hand, and eye 
and voice helped me to understand it. He resumed : — 
" Enough of that. You understand it, or will, when you 
get big enough. We have reached the spot in the road 
which I wish you to mark particularly, for it concerns your- 
self more than anybody else, I believe." 

Here he dropped my hand, which he had held all the way 
up the ridge, and stiffened himself upon his stirrups, his 
whip whistled as it cut the air, and the whole man was keyed 
up as tensely as the texture would bear. 

" You recollect," he began, " our talk that night at Tobj 
Myers's. Well, whether our friend Nancy got it in gossip 
there, or guessed her way to all she discovered, I don't 
know ; but it was not long after I knew my own secret that 
she had it very fully. Of course, she noticed my visits to 
the glen, and I had paid but few of them, after my return 
from home in February, till she knew all they meant. One 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 101 

day I was coming over and she knew it, and contrived to 
have me overtake her near the top of the hill. Supposing 
that she was coming to her uncle's, I, of course, dismounted, 
and, leading my horse by the bridle, walked beside her. I 
didn't like her, and I didn't like that she should be in my 
road where I was going either ; but I must be polite and 
bear it. 

11 We walked on, I in the mood that you may guess, and 
she occupied and agitated in a fashion that was decidedly 
alarming. Her manner was more than usually impressive, 
touched with a little more of that soft seductiveness which 
coarse people use to humbug verdant ones, than was com- 
mon with her. Sometimes she fell suddenly silent, with an 
air of troubled abstractedness, from which she would rouse 
herself with a sort of impassioned recklessness, which would 
soon give place again to a turn of tenderness, that, altoge- 
ther, made an object of me, and shook my nerves into a state 
that put me at her mercy. 

" When she talked, it was in her style of glowing elo- 
• quence, with, I thought, increased concentrativeness of con- 
ception and utterance. She was, in short, inspired with a 
strong purpose, and I caught it by contagion. I didn't 
know what it meant, nor whither tending ; but I was feel- 
ing and believing something great or terrible in advance, 
and was prepared for the fact or fancy, when it should come. 

" When we reached the spot I bade you notice, I was 
electrified to the right point and she knew it. She stopped 
suddenly, and turned full upon me, looking, I confess, grandly, 
— a little too grandly, to be sure, — but still it overcame me. 
Besides, she had taken advantage of the ground, and so had 
me in all respects just right for her purposes. 

" ' Brother Ashleigh,' said she, with a measured earnest- 
ness that made my heart beat, * you love Elizabeth. I know 



102 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

it ; nor do I wonder that it is so. She is an angel of beauty 
and goodness. I know her, as her cousin, her playmate, 
her friend and sister. I know her, as a woman only can 
know another ; and I declare to you that I never knew her 
equal in every excellence of heart and life. Her childhood 
was purer, I believe, than any other's, and she has lived a 
sinless life, if ever human soul did. Oh ! she has borne the 
selfishness, the very sins of other's like a saint, — she has 
borne mine, till I feel humbled before her. And if she had 
but an equal intellect, an equal sharpness and strength of 
understanding for her own defence, she would be the very 
paragon of the world ; and, alas ! would be as happy now 
as she is good and beautiful.' 

"Here she stopped, and looked me so pityingly in the 
face that I held my breath with fear. She saw it ; and 
clasping her hands upon her bosom, she turned her face 
toward heaven, with all her passions working into prayer in 
it, till it grew grand and almost beautiful. I see her face 
now ; I could paint it at a dash, if I were a painter ; I 
could stick it in the mist here as plain and palpable as life. 
Wherever I look, I see it ; it repeats itself, like masks in a 
fancy dance, wherever my eye turns. The pearly tear that 
glistens so gracefully in her eye was upon duty, looking like 
a great rain-drop upon a leaf, with the sun blazing on it, — 
all but the innocency. An impressive moment she stood, 
wrapt in a seeming agony of supplication, then her face came 
down again from its high pitch to the tone of pity. She 
hesitated — admirably the hesitation was done ; she trembled 
— the saint sank in the woman — she bent her head upon my 
shoulder, and sobbed out till I shuddered. Then she roused 
herself, dashed the tears out of her eyes, and spoke quick, 
and almost passionately : — 

" Brother Ashleigh, the Doctor urged this engagement ; 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 103 

he used all his art of persuasion, all his power, upon your 
noble confidence ; and he abused your trust. While he 
seemed only to answer your wishes, he in fact started them 
in your feelings. I know it must have been so, or you could 
not have been so horribly deceived.' 

" Well ?" said I, turning my horse square across the road, 
and clutching his by the mane, " Well ?" 

"Well, then, she dropped her head again, and seemed 
really convulsed with grief. Her tears rained upon my 
shoulder, and ' My poor, poor, ruined cousin ! my good, 
angel cousin ! my heart's sister V seemed to wrench her very 
life out in the utterance. A moment's silence, a strong 
shudder, and it came. Turning quickly from me, she stood 
droopingiy, while she said, in the deepest tones of grief and 
shame : ' Her beauty led him into sin, and he must find some 
one to marry her, for he was himself engaged, and could 
not ;' and, with a bound, she dashed down the hillside, and 
was hid from me in the thicket." 

"Ashleigh!" 
. "Doctor!" 

I believe I did as much hard swearing as might serve a 
pirate for a voyage in the next thirty seconds. I saw the 
wretch's picture now as plainly as Ashleigh did awhile before, 
and there seemed to me but one word in English profane 
enough to name it by — that word was Nancy. It was an 
oath to me for years after. 

When I looked round next my friend was just in sight. 
I waited for him, and when he joined me he was humming a 
hymn tune, long metre, very solemnly. 

"Have you any" more refreshing entertainment for me, 
Mr. Ashleigh?" said I ; "there is a relish about that last 
tit-bit that gives me an appetite. Why, what a gem of a 
gipsy we have among us ! That girl ought not to be thrown 



104 ELIZABETH BARTON. 

away upon trifles ; she is fit to plot for a kingdom. Among 
the fools and scoundrels of the great world she would make 
a figure. But, tell me what you thought, and said, and did 
about it. Your first thought first — I'm curious." 

" My thoughts ! I believe I did no thinking of any kind for 
an hour. My soul stood still like a frozen cataract. I passed 
the night in a very quiet sort of stupor. The mere mechan- 
ism of the mind carries on one's life pretty well, you know ; 
and, in the morning, I simply told Elizabeth that Nancy 
must not be invited to our wedding. That was all. And I 
never said a word about it to her till last week, when she 
urged me for my reason for the request." 

" And what did Elizabeth say, Ashleigh, after you told 
her ?" 

" She held her breath till my story was finished, and sat 
astonished and speechless till I left her to recover herself. 
An hour after she came to me, and said : l George I have 
poured out my thanks to heaven, and I come to bless you 
that you did not in any manner mention this to me before 
our marriage ; for I never could have fulfilled my engage- 
ment with you, with that horrible pit opened up between us. 7 
Again the promise is fulfilled to me, ' Upon all thy glory 
there shall be a defence.' n 

The solution is easy. Nancy had wakened up with a sur- 
prise to find the Reverend Mr. Ashleigh, a splendid preacher, 
a gentleman of rank and fortune, in love with her poor 
cousin ! poor, in a sense, to Nancy, that took all the pity 
out of it ; a spiritless, meek beauty, unconscious of her 
availabilities in the market, and stupidly devoted to silence, 
sacrifice and duty. To be undermined, and, in some sense, 
defrauded, by so simple a sheep of the flock, was almost 
incredible, but it was not the less certain. And counting 
upon Mr. Ashleigh's softness, by the same rule which had 



ELIZABETH BARTON. 105 

already misjudged Elizabeth, her plot was adjusted with 
great skill to the case, and as well executed. 

But, the devil would be only a fool in heaven, and would 
fail to make the angels misunderstand each other, whatever 
other success his villainies might meet with ; for the faith of 
a pure heart " tries the spirits," and discerns vital truth by 
its own instincts. 



THE DUEL. 

From the commencement of our Revolution till the year 
1815, a period of forty years, England was engaged in war 
without any intermission. These wars were with the thir- 
teen colonies, or United States, France, Spain, Holland, the 
French Republic, Bonaparte, and again with the United 
States ; sometimes singly, sometimes with several of these 
nations at once. 

The battle of Waterloo was fought on the 18th June, 
1815. That year the army of England amounted to three 
hundred thousand men ; and in 1845, although she had 
enjoyed thirty years of peace, her standing army was still 
one hundred thousand strong. 

In the time of peace one would think that such a host of 
soldiers could not be required for any purpose ; and they 
probably are not, but it is the policy of such governments 
as that of England to keep as many men in the public ser- 
vice as possible. To say nothing of other purposes, it is 
easy, in an army of a hundred thousand soldiers, to have 
four or five thousand commissioned officers, who generally 
belong to the class of gentlemen — a class that is found to fur- 
nish the most useful and thp most submissive slaves to those 
who feed them. The most useful, because, being well-born, 
well-educated and well-connected, they are very capable in 
themselves, and very influential with others ; and most sub- 
missive, because they are so well paid, and have no other 
service than public office which it suits them to accept. 

The army of England is crowded with officers who enter 



THE DUEL. 107 

it merely as a trade or profession, by which they may get a 
living. A horrid business it is, indeed, to undertake to do 
any killing of men anywhere that the Government may 
command, without asking any questions, or knowing or car- 
ing whether it is right or wrong ! But so it is, when 
rightly understood ; and yet, we must not be surprised if we 
find, once in a while, a man too good for such a trade 
. engaged in it, for it is generally thought honorable, even the 
most honorable of all professions, and but few stop to 
inquire if it is also right. 

My story will introduce the sort of man that is an excep- 
tion to the rule. 

To be perfectly candid with my readers, I must inform 
them that I have forgotten the names of the persons that I 
am to tell about. The precise place where it happened has 
also escaped me, but I am sure that it was somewhere in 
Ireland ; and the exact date is gone, too — but I know that 
it was after the year 1815, and before the year 1835, for 
that was the time when I heard it. 

The general peace of Europe, which followed the fall of 
'Napoleon, released the army of England from foreign ser- 
vice and, after reduction to about one-third of its former 
number, it was distributed among the military stations 
within the kingdom and provinces. A large number of the 
surviving officers of the field of Waterloo were garrisoned 
in Ireland. They were generally men who had seen hard 
service, and had earned their honors and offices in the bat- 
tle-field ; but a considerable number of new men received 
appointments through favor of their wealthy and powerful 
friends, and came among the veterans with commissions in 
their pockets which gave them high rank in the army. The 
old soldiers, naturally enough, looked upon these raw 
recruits as mere upstarts and intruders. They despised 



108 THE DUEL. 

them for their inexperience, and hated them for the injustice 
suffered by their promotion. In a profession where honor is 
gained by killing the country's enemies, it will scarcely be 
thought immoral to hate the individual's rivals and sup- 
pliers. The Apostle John says, that murder and hating 
one's brother go together. And, taking the military senti- 
ment for the standard of judgment, it is mean to beg or buy 
promotion, where other people have to fight for it. But 
this is done elsewhere, as well as in the British army ; for 
the offices which are thought the most honorable are often 
obtained by means the most dishonorable. 

The hero of my story was in this situation ; and whether 
he deserved the judgment we have passed upon his class, or 
not, he certainly suffered it in full measure. He had 
obtained, by patronage, the appointment of Ensign, after 
the establishment of peace, and was quartered, with some 
dozen or twenty officers of Wellington's army, in one of the 
cities of Ireland. An Ensign is the lowest commissioned 
officer, and the salary, or pay, is so small that it is a saying, 
"If an Ensign has wine for dinner, he must go without sup- 
per." Our Ensign was very poor — he was friendless, very 
young, and constitutionally shy. 

On the other hand, the officers of the station were gene- 
rally well supplied with money, and had nothing to do but 
spend it ; they lived fast and high, and were, by all their 
habits and tastes, unpleasant companions for such as he. 
Besides his retiring manners, there was something else in 
him which disinclined him to their society, and exposed him 
to their dislike ; this was a certain air of self-respect, show- 
ing refinement and culture, and a strict propriety of lan- 
guage and manners, which quietly, but all the more severely, 
rebuked their general looseness and rudeness of conduct. 
They hated him for the manner he entered the army, and 



THE DUEL. 109 

still worse for his personal character and demeanor among 
them. All this had its effect upon him also, and so the 
breach between them widened every day. 

A certain amount and kind of courtesy he was entitled to, 
by the rules of the service ; this they gave him, but so 
sharply measured out, that every salute was an affront, and 
every look an insult, and he might have had cause of quar- 
rel at any moment that he pleased. It was, in fact, the set- 
tled purpose of several of these men to drive him out of the 
army by their incivilities, or to drive him into a duel, and so 
dispose of him finally. 

Things grew worse continually. The contempt of the 
older officers for the young Ensign, and his repugnance to 
them, increased with every meeting, until they paid no kind 
of respect to his feelings, and he avoided them with a cau- 
tion that looked like antipathy. The worst of all was the 
evident conviction in the minds of the whole garrison that 
he was a coward — a character most shameful in a soldier, 
and, in any man, a weakness that renders every other virtue 
worthless. 

Poor fellow ! he was alone, friendless, and without a dol- 
lar in the world but his monthly pay. With these beggarly 
circumstances he was a scholar and a gentleman, with feel- 
ings rendered over-sensitive by high culture and recent mis- 
fortunes. But his chief impediment was a conscience — a 
religious sense of right, which left him no liberty to relieve 
himself or mend his prospects by any means which the high- 
est morality forbade. He suffered much every way, and 
most of it all he endured for " righteousness sake." Of 
course he had the strength and nobleness which such a sen- 
timent bestows ; but it is easier to do great things than to 
bear little ones. There are more heroes than saints in the 
world. St. Peter was not afraid of the soldiers in the gar- 



110 TtiE DUEL. 

den, but lie was ashamed of his master in the Judgment 
Hall. To bear disgrace, and shame, and scorn, to stand 
quiet under suspicions that drive one out of society, for the 
sake of a principle which nobody believes or respects — this 
is cross-bearing. 

Our young hero occupied the position of a soldier and a 
gentleman, with the character of a coward and a slave ! It 
was a bitter cup, and his enemies kept it constantly to his 
lips. 

One day he received an invitation, as a matter of course, 
to dine with the General in command, who had just arrived 
at the station. A meeting with his brother officers pro- 
mised him no pleasure, and he was personally a stranger to 
the General, who knew nothing of him but by report of 
those who despised him. He managed to arrive at the lat- 
est allowable moment, and he contrived to procure a seat at 
table next to the General, who, both as his host and supe- 
rior officer, was bound to afford him protection from the 
insolence of the company. 

I need not say how the dinner hour passed with him. 
Totally silent and neglected, except for the necessary notice 
of the General, the time, so full of pleasure to the company, 
wore away heavy and painful to him ; but he was contented 
to escape rudeness, and made indifference comparatively 
welcome. 

After the cloth was removed the wine circulated, the 
company drank freely, the mirth grew loud, and the presence 
of our young friend was nearly forgotten, until a circum- 
stance of a startling character brought him into notice. 
The General suddenly cried out, " Gentlemen, I have lost 
my watch — I had it in my hand ten minutes ago, but it is 
gone." A painful suspense instantly followed ; every man 
exchanged glance s with his neighbor,' until at last every eye 



THE DUEL. Ill 

settled with suspicion upon the young Ensign. Who but 
he, of all the company, could be guilty of such a crime ? 
Besides, he was, perhaps, the only man near enough to the 
General to effect the theft. Such thoughts as these were 
in every mind — they left not a shade of doubt. The miser- 
able wretch was caught at last ; and there was as little pity 
as respect felt for him. 

" Shut the door," shouted the Colonel of the regiment, 
" let no man leave the room. The watch is among us, and 
it concerns every man present to fix the guilt where it belongs. 
I propose that a search be instantly made, and let it begin 
with me." 

"By no means," interposed the General. "It shall not 
be so. No gentleman is capable of such an act. A hundred 
watches are not worth the impeachment of any gentleman's 
honor. Say no more about it. It has no special value above 
its price, and I care nothing about that." 

" But, General," said the Colonel, " the watch is in the 
room. One of us must have it," looking sternly at the young 
Ensign, " and the rascal must be driven from the station. 
We cannot have a pickpocket among us, and we cannot con- 
sent to leave it a moment in doubt who the wretch really is. 
There is no fear that the shame will fall in any unexpected 
place. We must finish the fellow now, and be done with 
him." 

The Ensign sat steady, motionless and pale as death. 
Every eye was fixed .upon him, and to every eye the signs 
of guilt were perfectly clear. The General had no doubt of 
it, and he was the more anxious to prevent the search on 
this account ; but he was overcome, and submitted. A few 
minutes sufficed for the examination of every one present, 
till it came to the Ensign, who was left purposely to the last. 

" Now, young man," said the Colonel turning and advanc- 



112 THE DUEL. 

ing toward him, "now, sir, it is your turn ;" his face look- 
ing perfectly savage with scorn and hate. " The watch, sir, 
without a word or a moment's delay !" 

But a terrific change had passed upon the long-suffering, 
patient boy. He sprang from his seat with a scream so 
wild, so fierce, and so full of agony that every heart stood 
still a moment with surprise. In that moment he had planted 
himself against the wall, drawn his sword, and taken the 
attitude of defence. 

" Come you to search we, sir, as you would a suspected 
thief ? On your life, I warn you not to offer me that indig- 
nity. My dead body you may search, but not my living- 
one. Approach now if you dare. I defy the whole of you 
as one man I" 

Instantly the Colonel crossed swords with him in furious 
combat. 

" Hold ! peace ! arrest them !" cried the General, and 
sprang forward himself to prevent the affray. At the first 
step, the watch rolled on the floor ! He had missed his fob, 
and now the watch fell from its concealment in the violence 
of his movements. The company was electrified. The con- 
duct of the Ensign was inexplicable ! He had braved 
destruction, risked his reputation, and perilled his life, on a 
point of honor too nice for his superiors to feel ; and he had 
insulted and defied them all in one breath, and there he stood 
justified and victorious before them ! 

It was too much to bear, for they ^rere too much excited 
to understand it. Their determination was taken, and the 
company dispersed with resolutions set, and purposes inflexi- 
ble. The General seized the opportunity to apologize to 
the Ensign for the unhappy mistake which led to the quarrel, 
and requested him to call upon him that evening at a late 
hour. 



THE DUEL. 113 

Our hero was scarcely in his own room till the Colonel's 
challenge was presented to him. Without a moment's delay 
he answered the second who brought it : "I will not accept 
this challenge to mortal combat. I am opposed to the duel 
on principle, and I will not be driven from my sense of duty. 
You all know what I have already endured rather than 
revenge or defend myself by taking life. I think you have 
done your worst, but if not, I am prepared for it. I am my 
own master, and will not allow any man to dictate my 
opinions in a matter of right, or compel me to conduct which 
my heart and head condemn. 

11 Sir," replied the second, " you have seen fit to include 
me among the men who despise you, and you are right in 
that opinion. Let me tell you, that cowardice and conceit, 
covered with preaching and canting, will not protect you. 
You have grossly insulted every gentleman in the garrison, 
to whom you were odious enough before, and you must either 
give them the satisfaction which the code of honor approves, 
or you must leave the army. Be assured of that." 

When he met the General that night, and informed him 
of the challenge and his refusal, that officer shook his head 
and looked at him sadly and earnestly, if not doubtfully. 

" My dear young friend," said he, " I am afraid it won't 
do. These men will not be satisfied with an argument, and 
it is plain that you are not the man to make an apology 
while convinced that you are right, nor do I believe that 
they would accept anything short of your resignation. You 
have somehow got the ill-will of the whole corps, and to-night 
you affronted them mortally. I am sure you cannot know 
how sharply your conduct and language touched them, and 
your triumph only aggravated the offence. And, now, your 
refusal to accept the Colonel's challenge is, under the most 
favorable construction, an attack upon the code by which 



114 THE DUEL. 

military men govern themselves toward each other. I see no 
escape. Fight you must, or your challenger will heap upon 
you such personal indignities as will make your life intoler- 
able, or drive you into violence, which will amount to the 
same thing as accepting his challenge. I saw that in your 
eye to-day which convinces me that you are as brave as Julius 
Csesar. Yes, I saw something there braver than mere phy- 
sical courage, and I felt its superiority ; but, you cannot 
convert the world and reform the army soon enough to answer 
your own ends, and you must submit to its rules, or be driven 
from it in disgrace. I honor your principles, for I under- 
stand them, but you cannot maintain them." 

Our hero's reflections that night must be left to imagina- 
tion. The difficulties which surrounded him, the compulsions 
that were upon him, can be known only to those who have 
been tempted and tried to the utmost, with the world and 
their own necessities against them. 

In the morning he accepted the challenge. 

Having the right to choose the weapons, he named the 
small-sword. When the Colonel heard this, with a touch of 
feeling, which all his bitterness could not quite extinguish, 
he said : " Does the moth know that he is fluttering into the 
flame?" The second answered, "I told him that you are 
reputed the best swordsman in the army, and begged him to 
choose pistols, which would give him some chance of equality 
in the fight, but he declined. In fact, I don't know what 
to make of this young fellow — like the sword that he has 
chosen to fight with, he is so limber, and yet so elastic and 
mettlesome, sometimes ; he is such a mixture of methodist, 
mule and madman, that I cannot make him out. And, 
Colonel, he is not a light bargain, either, for anybody. It 
seems to me that you were making nothing off him, yester- 
day, when the General interfered. The fellow actually stood 



THE DUEL. 115 

up handsomely, and made very pretty play with his weapon. 
To tell the truth, I'm beginning to like him a little, and I 
feel sorry that he must be disposed of in your peculiar way." 

The Colonel muttered, grimly, " If I must kill the rascal, 
I'm glad he shows some pluck and capacity in the business ; 
I don't want to be a boy-butcher." 

The next morning, at early sunrise, they met on the field 
of honor. 

When the ground was prepared, and the champions stood 
armed and ready, the Ensign suddenly lowered his sword 
point, and, addressing his antagonist, said : " Sir, I am here 
under compulsion, merely. I do not consent to this practice. 
To me - it is absurd as it is wicked. It settles no right, 
and it redresses no wrong. Let me say, then, that if my 
patience has given way under my persecutions, and if I have, 
by a hasty word or act, justly offended you, I am willing to 
retract it. What is your complaint ?" 

" Young man, I came here not to preach, but to fight. I 
came here not to confer with you about nice points in casu- 
istry, but to punish your impudence ; but, if you have no 
relish for that, I will spare your life, on condition that you 
leave the army — take your choice." 

The Ensign's answer was prompt and firm : 

"You will have it so — I am guiltless," and the fencing 
began. 

The seconds and witnesses had never seen such a display 
of skill, and they never dreamed of such a result. In five 
minutes the Colonel was disarmed, and at the mercy of the 
insulted and outraged boy ! 

Heated by the struggle, and excited by the imminent peril 
and bloody bitterness and fury of his enemy, he turned 
from him somewhat haughtily, with — "I have taught you 
a lesson in sword-play, and now I will set you another. 



116 THE DUEL. 

which you need even more — an example of moderation in 
success." 

The ColonePs mortification and rage seemed to know no 
bounds. 

" I accept no favors from such a canting, phrase-making 
sentimentalist — such a mere fencing-master — such a trickster 
and conjuring sword-player as you are," the Colonel burst 
out through his grinding teeth. " You knew well, what you 
were about when you chose these toys to play tricks with. 
If you have a sentiment of honor left in you, let me have 
pistols. I tell you this quarrel is not made up. I will not 
have my life at your gift. You shall take it or I will take 
yours. The quarrel is to the death, and there is a blow to 
clinch it," striking at the Ensign in a transport of passion, 
which he avoided with equal coolness and dexterity. 

The seconds interfered, and even the spectators cried 
shame ; but it was clear enough that blood must flow before 
the parties should quit the ground. The Ensign's second, 
carried away by the excitement, urged him to accept the 
new challenge or change of conditions, for he despaired of 
any other adjustment. 

" Will nothing satisfy this madman but my life ?" said the 
young officer, deeply agitated. 

" You have made him mad," said the second, " and there is 
nothing left for it but a fatal issue. You have the right to 
refuse, having already spared his life, and I will sustain you ; 
but I do not advise it, for it will be unavailing in the end." 

"I have gone too far," replied the Ensign, sadly, "too 
far from the line of strict principle, to recover it now. I 
cannot any longer say that I am opposed to fighting ; I 
have broken down that defence by yielding to an expediency 
which I thought a safe one. Oh, it is horrible ! I did not 
dream this morning that I might die a fool's death to-day." 



THE DUEL. 117 

" You will accept the offer/' hastily interposed the second ; 
"you must be a good shot, with such an eye and hand, and 
such self-possession as you have shown to-day. If your pis- 
tol matches your sword you cannot miss him, and upon my 
soul, he deserves it, and I say let him have it. You accept." 

The Ensign stood silent. The ground was measured, the 
pistols prepared, and the combatants stationed. The word 
was given. One — two — three. The Colonel's pistol was 
discharged at the instant, and the Ensign stood untouched. 
He had reserved his fire, and had the right now to take 
deliberate aim. Steadily he raised the deadly weapon till 
it bore point blank upon the Colonel's heart, and there it 
rested a minute in terrible suspense ; not a nerve quivered, 
not a limb trembled in either, and the spectators helcT their 
breath hushed as the death they waited for. But suddenly 
wheeling, the Ensign marked a post in a different direction, 
at twice the distance of his antagonist, and, pulling the 
trigger, delivered his ball in it, breast-high. It was a centre 
shot, and instantly fatal if a living man had stood there. 
The next instant, throwing down the pistol with decision 
that could not be mistaken, he cried out : "I will go no 
farther in this wicked folly. If there is nothing else left for 
me but murder or submission, I will submit." 

The grandeur of his position was too striking now to be 
mistaken or denied. The Colonel was the first to acknow- 
ledge it. Twice within the hour he owed a life to the mag- 
nanimity of a man he had so much abused. That man stood 
now vindicated, even by the hard laws of war and honor — ■ 
he was neither trickster nor coward. Possibly the Colonel 
felt something of the higher nobility of the young man's 
principles, but I will not be sure of that. He found him 
brave and generous, and that was enough, without looking 
deeper for the hidden springs of the nobler life within him. 



US THE DUEL. 

Advancing to him, he offered his hand, apologized frankly 
for all his misconduct, acknowledged his misconception of 
the character which he had put to so severe a trial, and 
added that he was willing to owe his life to "the bravest 
man he had ever met, either as friend or foe." 

" Brave !" said the young man with the color mounting 
to cheek and brow. " Brave ! Colonel — pardon me — 
Heaven pardon me ! True bravery consists in refusing to 
fight altogether. But I have betrayed a principle which I 
should have valued more than life ; I have risked my life — 
not for that principle, but to satisfy a caprice — I am the 
miserable hero of a miserable falsehood, instead of the mar- 
tyr of a great truth. I have lost confidence in myself and 
men's prrises only mock me." 



BUFF. 



When I was a very little boy I had a very big dog. He 
took his name from his color — it was Buff — not from his 
character, for he was as remarkable for magdoganimity as 
for strength and courage. He was very patient, too; all 
the worry and work that a seven-year old urchin could inflict 
upon him in a long holiday never disturbed his equicaniani- 
mity. He probably had once been a puppy, but no one who 
knew him would think of uncoiling such an inference from 
the principles of natural history to his prejudice — he was 
every inch and every ounce a dog, and one of the biggest 



BUFF. 119 

and noblest of the race, at that. How he hated the harness 
of my little wagon in summer, and board-sled in winter! 
He was faithful, and fond of his little master; but naturally 
enough, while he performed the duties and felt the sentiments 
of a dog, he resisted the degradation of a hack. Xothing 
else ever made him exhibit any doggedness of temper. I 
never caught him in a sneak except when he was trying to 
escape the collar and traces; nor at a dodge, except when a 
hole in a fence, or the low door of his dormitory, offered him 
the opportunity of stripping me off his back. My troubles 
and tumbles of this sort often ruffled my temper with him; 
but more mature reflection has long since reconciled me to 
his conduct in this respect, and in the "late remorse of love,"' 
I admit that he was right. Alas, poor Buff! Every dog, 
they say, has his day; but Buff's was shamefully shortened. 
A beggar poisoned him; for it was a principle with him 
never to let a tatterdemalion cross our door-step. He had 
an opinion and a post to maintain — he had some dignity of 
his own, and, of course, a decent indignation against vaga- 
bonds deficient in both dress and address. He suspected 
them of fleas, perhaps; perhaps of felony; anyhow, he could 
not abide them; and if it was only a capricious antipathy, I 
don't think it a very serious impeachment of his otherwise 
unquestionable philanthropy. He may have been a reformer, 
and had amission; and for that reason, must be excused if 
he garrisoned the premises with rather severe fidelity. 1 
doubt not that excellent authorities can be found for growling 
and barking alarmingly for conscience's sake, and I claim the 
benefit for the justification of Buff; the more by token that 
the poor fellow fell a martyr to it at last. See, there is a 
doctrine and a parable even in the life and death of a clog. 

One day — how well I remember the day — I was trying 
to drive a family of refractory pigs out of the yard, and, after 



120 



BUFF. 



a dozen failures, called upon Buff for assistance. He had 
been looking on contemplatively for half an hour, while the 
struggle lasted, without offering any assistance or exhibiting 
any interest in the matter, and now absolutely refused to 
interfere. There was another witness of my perplexity — my 
father was standing on the porch, very quietly waiting for 
the result. A regular fight had begun with Buff for his 
insolent indifference and downright disobedience ; but, detect- 
ing the presence, and hoping for the interposition of the para- 
mount authority, I began m y complaint with, "Papa, what 
is the reason that Buff won't hunt these pigs ?" 

"Why, William, don't you know that a big dog will not 
worry little pigs ? If you want to have help at a mean little 
job, you must employ a puppy in the service." 

Buff was fairly vindicated, and I had a lesson which has 
served me many a time since. Just then I felt only the 
rebuke, without at all relishing it, and, indeed, without fully 
understanding its philosophy. 

That night, after saying my daily prayer, and feeling as 
good as if I had been whipped, or praised, or pardoned some 
little iniquity, and had my account with the world and the 
world to come happily squared, and at liberty to begin 
again, I renewed the complaint and apology by saying, 
"But, papa, what is the reason that Buff oughtn't to worry 
little pigs when they are in the yard, where they have no 
business to be ?" 

"Why, see here, my son; little pigs have some rights, even 
when they are doing wrong. Haven't they V } 

"No; I don't see how they can be right when they are 
wrong." 

Smiling in a way that made me think I was not quite up 
to the argument, although I could not see the kink in it, he 
answered: 



BUFF. 121 

"Well, then, if pigs are not quite right when they are 
wrong; or, what is a very different thing, if they have no 
rights when they are in anything wrong — as, for instance, 
in the wrong yard or wrong trough — little boys and little 
dogs may, nevertheless, be wrong in their way of turning 
them out — may they not ?" 

" I suppose so ; but " — 

" Come, come, William ; you can defend yourself any other 
time. Buff knows we are talking about him, and he is pres- 
sing in between us here, and looking at you, as much as to 
say, Little master, I can't speak for myself, you know. Do 
listen to what papa is going to say for me," 

"Get away, Buff," was my answer; "you have your 
great big paw on my toe that has a splinter in it." 

" He has a worse grip of you than that, William : he has 
you in the wrong. Put up your little foot, and let me see 
that dreadful sore toe. Tut, there is no splinter there." 

"But there was one, yesterday. See how red it is." 

" Red, William ; it isn't as red as your face ; and I know 
it doesn't hurt you as badly as you feel somewhere else." 

"I want to go to bed, papa." 

"No, no, my boy ; you are too wide awake just now for 
that. You have not been so wide awake, all over and all 
through, for a week ; and I want you to reflect, while you 
lie awake to think over this matter, that there are some 
things and some ways of doing things, that are unworthy of 
anything but puppies and mean people : no matter what 
wrongs they undertake to correct. You wouldn't smother 
a poor little pig in a puddle X ecause it happened to be tres- 
passing on your play-ground. You wouldn't kick a little baby 
with your boots on, for taking your piece of bread and but- 
ter that happened to fall within its reach, any more than Buff 
would crush the bones of a little pig for playing in the yard 

6 



122 BUFF. 

It is not what a wrong-doer may seem to deserve when you 
are angry, but what is becoming to yourself, that you should 
do. Now, my son, shake hands with Buff — poor Buff — and 
then with me, and go to your little bed. There, that's right ; 
now run along.' 7 

"But, papa"— 

"Never mind, now ; go, and don't walk as if you were 
carrying a weight, nor look as if it were too heavy for you. 
Open your window, for the robins will be singing in the 
apple-tree in the morning ; your dear little toe will be well 
as ever, and you will be as happy and merry as a bird again. 
You will be my own brave boy; and when you get to be a 
big one, you'll understand Buff." 

The moral of my story, as applied to the hunters of men, 
is — altered a little from the original — " In all your service, 
copy Buff." 



"TRIAL BY BATTEL." 

A duel is a fight between two persons with deadly 
weapons, according to some established rules, for the pur- 
pose of deciding a quarrel. In past "times it was much in 
use, under various forms, and upon various grounds and 
pretences. In our day it gets but little countenance from 
public opinion, and the laws of most civilized countries 
declare that the killing of a man in a duel is murder, and 
shall be punished as such. But the duel was not only 
allowed in England in early times, but it was actually 
appointed and employed as a legal method of trial in certain 
kinds of lawsuits about property, and in criminal charges 
generally. Indeed, this "trial by wager of battle," as it 
was called, was not abolished by law until the year 1811, 
though it had not been actually used since the time of 
Charles the First, or about two hundred years ago. It was 
introduced into English law by "William the Conqueror (in 
the year 1066), who brought it with him from Normandy, 
as a part of that barbarous and superstitious system of mili- 
tary government which he established upon the ruins of the 
ancient Saxon institutions. The Germans, when they were 
first known to the Romans, had this custom ; and among 
the Goths, in the country now called Sweden, it was, in like 
manner, a mode of trying suits at law. The first written 
authority for these judicial combats is found in the laws of 
Burgundy, A. D. 500. In England for six hundred years, 
down till a century after the Reformation, the trial by bat- 
tle was in actual use under the laws of the land. It was 



124 



TRIAL 3Y BATTEL, 



resorted to as an appeal to " the God of battles," in the 
belief that he would give the victory to the party that had 
the right. The cases tried in this way were of the kinds in 
which there was some uncertainty, or difficulty, or impossi- 
bility of settlement by courts and juries upon the usual 
kinds of evidence and proof — in disputed land titles, for 
instance. In that early time written deeds and wills were 
not in use ; and when claims were set up which were so old 
that the witnesses were dead, or of any kind that the courts 
could not certainly determine, they were referred to this 
supernatural sort of decision. In criminal charges, if the 
offender was caught in the act, he was not allowed his appeal 
to arms ; but whenever there was a doubt, he might chal- 
lenge his accuser to decide it by combat. One of the oldest 
English law-writers justifies this custom by the example of 
the combat between David, on the part of the Israelites, 
and Goliah, the champion of the Philistines. So the Bible 
has been quoted in past times as authority for wrong doing, 
and so it is still perverted and abused in our own day. 

In civil cases — that is, in suits about property — the bat- 
tle was not fought by the parties to the suit, but by their 
champions, hired or otherwise obtained for the purpose. It 
is very likely that bullies were hired then as lawyers are 
now — to beat each other, only in a different way — a hard 
head then, a well-filled one now — stout arms then, a nimble 
tongue now ; and, in both, willingness to fight for either 
side of any case. In criminal cases, the combat was required 
to be in person, and not by attorney or champion, which 
means the same thing. But if either the accused or accuser 
were a woman, a priest, or under twenty-one years of age 
or over sixty, or lame or blind, such person might refuse the 
challenge, and have the case tried by a jury. 

When the battle was appointed and the combatants 



"trial by battel." 125 

entered the field, they took an oath in which each declared 
that his cause was just ; and where the champions fought 
for hire, they took the same oath, and furthermore swore 
that they used no magic, sorcery, or enchantment. The 
precise words of this last declaration were these — " Hear 
this, ye justices, that I have this day neither ate, drank, nor 
have upon me neither bone, stone, nor grass, nor any enchant- 
ment, sorcery, or witchcraft, whereby the law of God may 
be abased, or the law of the devil exalted. So help me God 
and his saints." 

The judges attended these legal combats in their robes of 
office, that they might witness the result and give judgment 
in the suit accordingly. But the battle was not fought with 
deadly weapons, and death seldom ensued. Each party was 
furnished with a baton or staff an ell long (about four feet), 
and a four-cornered leathern target for defence. If the 
defendant in the action could maintain his defence till the 
stars appeared in the evening, or killed his antagonist, or 
forced him to yield and cry " craven," his defence was judged 
. complete. If he yielded, or was killed, his case was decided 
against him. In criminal charges, if the accuser killed the 
accused, it was taken for the decision of Providence ; or if 
he pressed him so hard that he could not or would not fight 
any longer, he was condemned and punished forthwith as 
guilty. On the other hand, if the accuser was conquered, 
he was pronounced infamous, and could never be a juror or 
a witness in any case afterwards, because, as it was said, he 
had sworn to a falsehood, and charged an innocent man with 
a crime. 

All the reasoning for this trial by battle, or legal duel, 
turned upon the presumption that in the kind of cases where 
human judgments were doubtful, the Divine Providence 
would decide the appeal as the real justice of the case 



126 "trial by 

required. Wars between different nations, and armed rebel- 
lions against despotic Governments, rest upon the same 
notion of presumed interference by Providence in disputes 
where there are no earthly courts or judges to decide 
between the parties. The trial by battle is the way that 
nations " go to law n now. One would think that the result 
of wars being so often manifestly against the right, and in 
favor of the wrong, the world would give up this supersti- 
tious notion ; but it is, nevertheless, true, that the weaker 
side at least, and the oppressed party, in all wars and revo- 
lutions, always take up arms in some confidence that the 
" God of Battles " will somehow fight for the right. And 
curiously enough, too, where the opposed armies are of the 
same religion, and even of the same nation also, they have 
clergymen, called army chaplains, who daily make public 
prayers to the same God for victory to both sides ! If these 
preachers in the opposite camps could be brought together 
into one prayer-meeting, each party calling upon the Supreme 
Being for the overthrow and destruction of the other, they 
would appear to us as they must appear to the angels. 
Good angels must weep and evil angels laugh at such a 
sight. 

The revolutionists all over Europe, in the year 1848 and 
1849, went to battle against kings and tyrants in this belief 
of the Divine assistance in killing their oppressors. Yet 
they were everywhere beaten by the superior force of their 
enemies, or by divisions and treachery among themselves. 

So far as we have been considering the duel between 
individuals and between nations, in the cases where it is 
either believed or pretended that Heaven will decide the 
trial according to justice, we need add no words to show 
how idle and foolish such a faith is. The words of Jesus to 
Peter in the Garden of Gethsemane are his answer to this 



''trial by battel." 127 

whole question — " Put up thy sword into its place ; for all 
they that take the sword shall perish by the sword." 
He would not employ or authorize one man to take the life 
of another. He that enjoins the forgiveness of injuries and 
the love of enemies can never help us to kill them. Besides, 
He adds that he has "more than twelve legions of angels" 
at his command, if he wished to destroy men's lives. (Mat- 
thew xxvi. 52, 53.) 

But the duel now has not the hardihood to call itself any- 
thing better than honorable revenge, or murder with fair 
play and an equal risk to both parties. It is no longer 
resorted to on any pretence that God will take part in the 
horrible struggle, and decide for the right, but it is under- 
taken in open defiance to the laws of God and man : 

u And if the holiest name is there, 
'Tis more in blasphemy than prayer." 

This is bad enough and wicked enough, and more so than 
one could think reasonable human beings could be guilty of ; 
but it is sometimes, perhaps always, more or less mean or 
cowardly, as well as brutal and bloodthirsty. More than 
one challenge has been given and accepted, and many a duel 
has been fought, too, in which one or both of the parties 
has felt as much of fear as of malignity. Duels arise in this 
way : Some one, having too little regard for justice or truth 
or good manners to govern his tongue and conduct with pro- 
priety, does another an injury, or offers him an insult. Xow, 
such a man is more likely to be a coward than a brave man 
in even the lowest sense of the word ; for sound courage is 
made up of confidence in one's self, in the Tightness of his 
own conduct and intentions, in the approbation of the 
good and wise, and in the Divine support. But the wrong- 
doer has none of these reliances, and he can have nothing 



128 

but mere animal hardihood to maintain him against the 
natural fear of truth and justice which threaten him with 
open shame, and this fear takes away all the proper man- 
liness of his daring. Audacity is not bravery, for it is 
blind and unprincipled, and will not support a man one 
moment in the presence of light and truth. 

But, the innocent and injured party in a quarrel may be a 
good and true man. Yes, and he will remain so until feel- 
ings of revenge and thoughts of murder drown out his bet- 
ter nature, and make him fierce, selfish, and reckless of right 
and duty. Can a good man consent to kill one whom a wife 
or child or parent loves, however unworthy that one may 
be ? Can a good man disobey all rightful authority ? Can 
a good man be absolutely relentless and cruel ? Alas ! 
when the demon of revenge and blood takes possession he 
drives out every virtue and every feeling that enters into 
the character of a brave man ; for where all law is defied 
there is no respect left for honor or fair play, and the mad- 
dened monster will take all the advantages which cowardice 
itself asks against a foe. Moreover, in nine cases out of ten, 
one or both the persons engaged enter into it, not willingly, 
but by a force which he has not quite courage enough to 
resist. He is really more afraid of the character of coward 
than of the little risk of a fight. Some bad friend, who 
cares nothing for another's risk, tells him that he must fight, 
and he suffers himself to be bullied into it. He sends a chal- 
lenge or accepts one in the hope that the quarrel may be 
made up before the fatal meeting, or, at the worst, after an 
ineffectual shot has been exchanged. In a word, he gets 
into it as other people commit other crimes — with a blind 
hope that the worst consequences may be somehow escaped. 
And then, there is the hope of getting credit for the very 
thing he most wants — courage. Oh, how anxious the coward 



"trial by battel." 129 

is for a character. So between the force of fools' opinions, 
which are strong with him, and the chance of escape, which 
is quite promising, and the prospect of a brag affair, the 
poor fellow will manage to pick up as much extemporaneous 
pluck as might help him to be hanged pretty decently if he 
happened to be going to the gallows instead of the field of 
honor. In favorable circumstances, with everything to help 
and everybody looking on, the most shabby fellows generally 
contrive to make a tolerable show of themselves. There is 
always and everywhere a grand difference between the lofty 
daring that becomes a man, and the poor counterfeit appear- 
ance that is put on to get the reputation of a man. But — 
we have a story to tell that will show up this matter better 
and more pleasantly than we can do it in a dull argument. 



6* 



130 MORTUART, 



Monstrous and false in form, 

But true and beautiful in promise ; 

"Wisdom and love, with savage force allied ! 

The plan, the purpose, and the means — 

The thought and will of God achieved 

Through discipline of pain! 

Vigilant, relentless, yet beneficent the law ; 

The wounds flow wine, the flesh is bread. 

Caucasus in calvary resolved ; 

The vulture slain, and the cross crowned. 

^Saiit is not punishment, and there is no I^atft. 

The world's hope but waits the great atonement, 

Each serving to his brother's use and suffering for his sin, 

And the divine for all. 

And the sacrifice shall not cease, nor justice reign 

Until 

Faith stands rendered into knowledge, 

And worship incorporates with work — 

Till the world's life obeys its science. 

And man is organized in unity 
With max, with nature, and with god. 

The universe is one — reconciliation is redemption — harmony is heaven. 

" The mystery hidden from the ages," 

Rendered by this key — 

The Sphinx shall perish, the curse cease, and death and hell 

be swallowed up 

in 



MORTUARY. 



i;n 




EXPLANATION OF THE SKETCH. 

Mr. Sartain's " Lot," in the Monument Cemetery of Philadelphia is a right- 
angled parallelogram, thirty-three feet by twelve. Close-planted cedar trees give 
to its two longer sides walls of evergreen. At the entrance of the avenue thus 
formed stand two Obelisks (monolyth) bearing a brief record of the interments. 
At the end of the avenue, and closing it, is the structure which supports the group 
represented by the engraving: it is in the form of the propylseum, gateway, or 
entrance to the court or vestibule of the ancient Egyptian temple. The structure, 
including the statuary, is sixteen feet high, the base seven. The Sphinx is four 
feet in length; the Psyche, four in height; or "small life size." They are 
metallic. The monument is of stone. On its plain centre slab or tablet is the 
inscription given on the opposite page, 



132 MORTUARi. 



In the apprehension that the Sphinx symbolizes the 
Design, the End, and the Discipline of life, the Minerva head, 
Yenus bosom, and brute body represent, respectively, the 
Wisdom, Love, and Corrective Force which rule in the 
economy of man's earthly existence. 

The fabulous monster serves as well to signify the mixed 
intelligence, affections, and animal instincts of the human 
constitution. The Greeks gave it the head and breasts of a 
woman, a human voice, the body of a dog, the tail of a ser- 
pent, the wings of a bird, and the paws of a lion, — human, 
reptile, quadruped and bird. The Egyptians made it some- 
thing less complex in form, but evidently intended an equal 
comprehensiveness of allusion. 

Employed here only for the higher significance of the Myth, 
its expressive intimation of the creative mind, benevolent 
aim, and providential policy, apparent in the history of human 
existence, are mainly intended ; and the accomodations and 
additions in the symbolism of the group and decorations are 
made to conform to this purpose. 

The sacred Tau of the Egyptians, suspended upon the 
bosom of the Sphinx by a necklace, formed of a serpent with 
its tail in its mouth, indicates the eternal creative energy. 
The figure of Psyche, or type of the soul, rests lightly upon 
the body of the Sphinx ; her right arm around its neck ; in 
her left hand a butterfly — immortality solving the enigma of 
sublunary life. 

The group of statuary rests upon the capping-stone of the 
monument ; below it, upon the cornice of the entablature, is 
a figure in alto relievo mourning over the ashes in a funeral 
urn, unmindful of the ascending spirit, symbolized by the 
winged flame, which forms in the composition the balance 
and contrast on the one side to the urn on the other. In 



MORTUARY. 133 

the cove cornice, immediately below the figure of Grief, the 
general form of Egyptian decoration is observed, with the 
difference of substituting for their winged globe an hour-glass 
encircled with an endless serpent. 

The design of the Monument, the model of the statuary, 
and the drawing engraved, are by Mr. Sartain. 

The Inscription was intended to be enigmatical. The 
underlying idea is that all religious faiths have a central cor- 
respondence, traceable through their diverse traditions and 
formulas ; and, that all are so far true as they are universal; 
thus, the Wisdom and Love of God are known of all men ; 
the goodness and severity of his providence are their hope and 
fear. Prometheus, the man-maker of the Greek mythology, 
so far corresponds to the Christ of the Christian system, 
that he is chained upon his rock from the beginning of the 
offence, as the Lamb is " slain (or nailed to his cross) from 
the foundation of the world v — the woes of earth echoed in 
the passion of the Creator till the sacrifice shall cease. 

Both the Greek and Christian system say of their vice- 
gerent Divinity " he hath borne our griefs and carried our 
sorrows ; yet, we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God f 
and afflicted." The parallelism of the Representative Man 
of the heathen creed and the " Second Adam n of Christianity 
is obvious in the most essential points : The cross of Calvary 
and the rock of Caucasus abide the curse till the atonement 
is complete and the redemption achieved. 

The Myth of the Sphinx is well rendered, in one of its 
striking aspects, by the idea that Life propounds its riddle 
to every traveller, destroying those who fail to solve it, and 
that the monster is fated to perish when its mystery is made 
known. When the disciples came to Jesus and asked him 
" Why speakest thou unto the multitude in parables ? " he 
answered and said unto them, "Because it is given unto you to 



134 MORTUARY. 

know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them 
it is not given." 

It is just as true of the insurgent physical forces of nature, 
and of the disturbed social relations of men, that they must 
be subdued and harmonized by the discoveries of natural 
science. 

This consummation is the world's hope. The oracle of 
Apollo declared that when the Sphinx's riddle should be 
resolved, there would be an end of the evil which she wrought 
on the earth. Isaiah the Evangelical prophet, Peter the 
apostle of the Messiah, and John the revelator of " the things 
which shall be hereafter," speaking for the past, the present 
and future of the Church, say, "We look for new heavens, 
and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness ; " and 
Paul, the grand expositor of the faith as it is received among 
us, declares that a time cometh when all rule, and all autho- 
rity, and all power (all executive government) shall be put 
under his feet — the feet of the Son of Man. Moreover " the 
Son (the representative man ; certainly not the Divinity) 
shall also himself be subject unto him that put all things 
under him, that God may be all in all." In other words, 
conformity to the divine order shall be spontaneous. Then 
the Wisdom and Love will be severed from their Sphinx-like 
union with disciplinary force ; Law will govern without penal 
sanctions ; and Liberty will reign in universal harmony — the 
Sphinx shall perish, the atonement cease, and "all that 
have followed Him in the regeneration," "filling up that 
which is behind of the afflictions of Christ," " being partakers 
of his sufferings, may be glad, also, with exceeding joy when 
his glory shall be revealed." 

So the atonement is laid upon all ; the patriot, sage and 
saint, in their several degrees, giving their lives for 
their brethren, take up 4heir cross and follow Him. 



FRENCH REVOLUTION OF 1848. 135 

that " having suffered with him, they may also reign with 
him." 

In a lower application of the oracle, it is noteworthy that 
Hercules, the type of all-conquering labor, slew the vulture 
of Prometheus ; suggesting that the evil of the natural world 
must be overcome by heroic industry — that Labor, the Im- 
manuel, the perpetual creator, the God-with-us, must subdue 
the enmity of matter and release humanity from its physical 
bondage and suffering. 



FRENCH REVOLUTION OF 1848. 

The steam-ship Cambria, which left Liverpool on the 
21th Feb., and arrived at New York on Saturday morning 
last, brought all the details yet received of the revolution 
which commenced in Paris on the 2 2d. The latest tele- 
graphic despatch from Paris is dated 1 o'clock, A.M., Feb. 
26th. The events of three days only are embraced in the 
reports received ; but these suffice to establish -the fact of 
the complete overthrow of the throne, the flight of Louis 
Philippe, the institution of a provisional government, and 
the probable erection of a republic. 

We have neither room for the particulars of this glorious 
achievement, nor language to express the emotions which it 
has awakened. The most malignant despotism in Europe is 



136 FRENCH REVOLUTION OF 18 4 8. 

demolished, and the greatest of her oppressed nations is free! 
Ever since that bastard birth of the three glorious days of 
1830 has been upon the throne, he has been laboring to blast 
its aims and disappoint its purposes ; he has shackled the 
the press, abridged popular representation, and resisted the 
generous spirit of social reform. Abusing the trust reposed 
in him, he steadily advanced from one stage of encroachment 
upon the rights of the people to another, until virtually he 
took the attitude of open war against the French nation. 
He fortified Paris, garrisoned it with 100,000 troops and 
sentinelled the kingdom with 300,000 more. Thus secured 
and provided, he addressed himself to the work of extinguish- 
ing the last spark of popular liberty. His police courts 
punished the slightest indications of the reform spirit, whe- 
ther they occurred in political papers, industrial tracts, 
theological essays or album poetry, until the censorship of 
the press became as petty in its details, as it was sweeping 
in extent and monstrous in spirit. To guard himself against 
the danger of free speech he forbade the assemblies of the 
people, their processions and banquets, by which they sought 
to promote the peaceable redress of grievances and the pro- 
gress of political and social reform. This last aggression 
brought on the crisis. He attempted to prevent a grand 
Convention of the reformers, appointed for the 22d of Feb. 
The people, nevertheless, gathered in multitudes in the streets 
— they were dispersed by the regular troops — they assem- 
bled again and again, and as often met the military in all the 
confidence of right and all the courage of a generous enthu- 
siasm. The masses offered themselves not so much for battle 
as in sacrifice to the soldiery, and in a spirit that rendered 
their slaughter impossible even to mercenaries. The National 
Guard sympathized with the people, and from them the army 
caught the contagion and declared for reform, 



FRENCH REVOLUTION OF 1848. 131 

On the 24th the King abdicated in favor of the Count de 
Paris. It was too late. Friday, a republic was proclaimed, 
and, in the name of the sovereign people, a provisional govern- 
ment was published, among whom we recognize Arago, the 
astronomer, Lamartine, and Louis Blanc, a distinguished 
writer of the Fourierite school. The same day an order was 
issued, in the name of the French people, in which the meet- 
ing of the Ex- Chamber of Peers was interdicted, signed by 
the members of the provisional government. 

In the progress of these affairs the Tuilleries was captured 
by the people, the furniture destroyed, and the throne burnt 
in the street. The army had abandoned the defence of the 
palace, and the royal family fled from the city. 

Five hundred of the citizens, no more, were killed in the sev- 
eral affrays, and the last accounts reported the fighting at an 
end and the peace and order of the city restored. 

Come what may of all this, the event fills us with the 
deepest religious joy. Physical force of the most imposing 
magnitude has once more been met by moral power and dis- 
, armed as by enchantment. Despotism has been taught that 
standing armies are no security for thrones ; that might melts 
away in the august presence of right. Cobbling conservatism 
has an opportunity to compare itself with regenerating radi- 
calism; the quickest and best way of redressing hoary-headed 
grievances is demonstrated, and the Solomons of Political 
Science have learned that whether the people are fit to gov- 
ern themselves or not they intend to do it. 

The French people in their first Revolution had to fight 
their way up through such depths of debasement and dark- 
ness that they grew savage in the desperate strife. Like 
King David, their hands were so full of blood when their 
enemies were all conquered, that they were unfit to build the 
temple. They had, like him, however, collected the most 



138 FRENCH REVOLUTION OF 184 S. 

magnificent materials, and in 1830 it went up almost without 
the sound of a hammer. But a new dispensation has been 
given; the sacrifices of the old became intolerable, and its 
ritual a mockery, and now in three days it is overturned; not 
one stone is left upon ancther, and its ministrations are dis- 
tributed over the whole discipleship of republican liberty. 

We don't want to frighten good people into philosophical 
fits with our fanaticism. We hold the same creed for the 
world which they do for themselves, and only ask that its 
doctrines shall receive universal application. Nor do we mean 
to construe it so rigidly, even in favor of life and liberty, as 
to affirm that all men are born equal in all things, but only 
that all men ought to be held equal before the laws in those 
respects in which they are equal before God. We believe, 
indeed, that " different measures of the same spirit are given 
unto every man to profit withal," but we cannot therefore 
agree that any one shall monopolize his neighbor's. share be- 
cause it happens to be a small one. In a word, our notion is 
that the Creator made every man purposely, and that he will 
answer that purpose if he is as well managed' as he is made. 

The old doctrine of the social compact, which holds that 
men must surrender an indefinite number of their rights, upon 
entering into society, in order to secure the balance, is a most 
villainous philosophy, invented by Prerogative, to justify its 
frauds upon human rights to any extent which might suit its 
own convenience. It bases itself upon the falsehood that, 
isolation is the state of nature, and society a matter of con- 
vention. The truth is, that man is social by his constitution, 
as much as sheep and crows are gregarious by theirs; and 
every faculty and power given to him is capable of harmoni- 
ous and beneficent action in the social and political organi- 
zations adapted to human nature. It would reproach the 
wisdom and power of the most ordinary mechanic, if he put 



FRENCH REVOLUTION OF 1848. 139 

one wheel more or less into a machine than its movements 
required; and it would be no less discreditable to him, if he 
made any of them so weak or so strong as to endanger the 
rest by its legitimate play. If the existing order is incom- 
patible with the liberty of all, it is the fault of the institution ; 
mend that; don't mar the man. 

Moreover, it is less expensive of life and happiness for men 
to govern themselves any way they please, than to be gov- 
erned by a few in the way which they don't like. Moreover 
again, men cannot in fact be governed by anybody any bet- 
ter than they are capable of, and that much they can do for 
themselves. 

People talk of anarchy and despotism as if convulsions 
were more dangerous than consumption. It is nonsense; 
authority sheds more blood, breaks more hearts, and crushes 
more greatness in any month, than popular revolutions and 
popular governments do in a century. Five hundred people 
were killed in Paris the other day — what then ? The invio- 
lability of life is not in its continuance but in its freedom. 
Killing people dead is not the crime of crimes ; killing them 
alive — the death that never dies — is the essential hell which 
human tyranny inflicts. The loss of life! why, the majority 
of those men lost nothing of their life by a violent death, 
they lived it out to its full measure in one comprehensive 
aspiration, one mighty effort which exerted to exhaustion 
all the powers within them. A charge of gunpowder does 
more burning in one flash, and with tenfold more effect, than 
the saltpetre and charcoal would accomplish, if they were 
kept smouldering for a month. We are far from believing 
that " a revolution is not worth one drop of blood." We 
would agree with O'Connell if he had said that a revolution 
is not worth one crime, because it is made worthless by the 
crime Liberty is cheap enough to the gainers at the 



140 "VI SIONAR Y." 

price of life ; not of the lives they take but of those they 
give. 

If the French people fall again into confusion, if they rush 
into anarchy and civil bloodshed, or what is even worse, if 
they compromise principles and patch up a false peace, based 
upon incoherent systems, we will neither wonder nor despair. 
We do not despise our fellow men, and we do not fear them: 
we are just as certain that they are competent to their own 
regeneration as we are that God made them for goodness and 
happiness; and, just as surely as we are immortal, our eyes 
shall yet behold the consummation, and we wait and look in 
a hope that rises out of the nature of man, and rests upon 
the promises of Heaven. 



" VISIOXARY !" 

Sixty years ago Herman Husband, of Somerset, Pennsyl- 
vania, predicted that the road, then only a pack-horse path 
over the mountains, would yet be paved all the way from 
Philadelphia to Pittsburgh. "Within the lifetime of the chil- 
dren who heard him, the promised paved road has been made 
and become obsolete ! the canal dug beside it has fallen behind 
the demand, and steam velocity already replaces them all ! The 
visionaries of the present day are, very likely, as much short 
of future history in their hopes as Herman Husband was in 
his day. But prophets will at last work themselves into 
credit ; the world will learn faith, and its works will grow 
continually more and more worthy of its origin and its des- 
tiny. Fulfilment follows so close upon the heels of predic- 
tion already, that conservatism is getting afraid to throw 
stones at the prophets, lest they may hit the facts in the 
face. 



ESSAYS. 



METAPHYSICS. 



Revival of mental science — Experiment, legitimate in the material sphere, but inca- 
pable of directing discovery and improvement in the moral — Empiricism of social 
and political systems — The Church affords no societary science — Metaphysics 
practically repudiated — Physical and Metaphysical departments of mental philo- 
sophy — The Baconian method adapted to the former, but incapable of the latter — 
The method of the schools illogical and unscientific — A true and useful system 
attainable — A Chemistry of mind demanded — Revolutionary crises favorable to 
speculative inquiries. 

I propose a series of articles which may as well muster 
under this general title as under any other. I wish the 
word to be taken in all its acceptations — in the loosest popu- 
lar use as well as in the closest technical meaning. I do 
not design a systematic discussion, nor any such orderly 
arrangement of topics as a scientific treatise would require. 
It is my purpose to traverse the province of Mental Philoso- 
phy, and its adjunct and dependent departments, in such 
directions, and with such method, as the pursuit of practical 
truth may determine. 

A religious honesty of aim is relied upon to take care of 
the spirit of the inquiry: the surpassing value of the truth 



142 METAPHYSICS. 

involved is offered in justification of the hardihood of criti- 
cism and audacious freedom of opinion which will be 
indulged. 

Just now, booksellers' catalogues and quarterly reviews 
seem to indicate a revival in the science. New books are 
being written, old ones republished, and systems old and 
new are undergoing the process of digestion and reformation. 
Whether its philosophy will be made presentable to the mil- 
lion, and whether it is either hoped or proposed to bring it 
down from the clouds and subdue it into the service of the 
world's immediate wants, does not clearly appear. There is 
a felt demand for such guidance in settling the policy of life 
as the science of mind ought to afford. This an age of 
revolution, both in the form of pacific progress, and of change 
by military violence. Precedent is not only at fault, but is 
itself the offender; and Experience, which is nothing but the 
world's own shadow, projected upon its pathway by the light 
of the past, offers darkness just where direction is demanded. 
Society is not counter- marching upon authority, and it asks 
now the light that shines out from the point of destination 
for the guidance of every footstep in its progress. 

It is an age of battle and blood, indeed, but there is some- 
thing else and higher than mathematics involved in the con- 
duct of the strife. At least one of the combatant parties 
on every field is developing an idea, and asserting an opinion; 
and that universal agitation, called pacific, which is at work 
upon the order and institutions of society, social, industrial, 
religious, and political, deals directly with abstract ideas and 
fundamental truths — all the forms of movement which char- 
acterize the age are so many appeals to first principles, so 
many wars of opinion; and they all seek adjustment by the 
laws of the dominant spirit life, which is alike the impulse 



M ET-APH Y SIC S . 143 

and the end of the entire apparatus of being which sur- 
rounds it. 

It might be supposed that wars and great social vicissitudes, 
which give so much value to physical forces and material 
elements, would be unfriendly to the cultivation of speculative 
science, but the facts of history and the reason of the thing 
are against this notion. The greatest advances in theoretic 
truth ought to be made amid the strifes which put first 
principles most earnestly in issue. The exigencies of pressing 
need reveal to communities, as to individuals, the resources, 
and supply the powers, which they demand, There is, in 
fact, no condition of things so favorable for mental achieve- 
ment as an environment of the intensest life. Human des- 
tiny being the subject, not of fate, but of law, depends so 
closely and critically upon the adaptation of means to ends, 
that, by Divine pre-appointment, the circumstances which 
most require the direction of a great thought, shall be ever 
the best adapted to its development — witness the proclama- 
tions of Provisional Governments, the reports of revolution- 
ary committees, and the insurrectionary eloquence of all 
reformations and rebellious. The prophets appear in the 
times of the world's sorest need — the hour and the man come 
together, and mind answers to movement with Providential 
adjustment. 

We have a proverb, that "amid wars the laws are silent," 
and it is true that some of the arts of peace are interrupted; 
but the laws and labors which wars, civil and international, 
suspend, are only the municipal systems and those handi- 
crafts which are by physical necessity involved in the strife. 
The biographies of the men who have moulded the mind of 
ages exhibit the fact, that the greatest achievements of intel- 
lect have been made amid the din of arms, and in great con- 
vulsions of society, from the days of Moses down to that 



144 METAPHYSICS. 

grand epoch in the revolutions of political systems, and the 
equally great revolutions in science, which commenced at the 
close of the last century. The fact corresponds to a similar 
one in the material sphere — the grandest chemical phenomena 
depend for their display upon a certain elevation of temper- 
ature or a certain excitation of electricity. The sphere of 
mind seems to be under the same law, for it is manifest that 
passion, far more eminently than knowledge, is power. 

It is natural, moreover, for society, when it finds its con- 
ventions going to pieces, to look closely into the essential 
nature and constitution of things ; and that when it is 
wrenched from its moorings and thrust out upon the deep, it 
should put its trust in science and betake itself to star- 
gazing. The route of experiment is on a trackless, shoreless 
ocean ; its march is over the earth, but its directory is in the 
heavens: the unknown is revealed by the abstract, as the 
parallels of latitude are discovered by their correspondents 
in the skies. 

It is clear that the world's life is under law, and that its 
happiness depends upon conformity to the nature and necessi- 
ties of the human mind. Those institutions alone sustain 
themselves against perpetual change which correspond to the 
laws of mental life. The family group, guarded by its divine 
instincts, is preserved in its integrity amid the dismember- 
ment of empires and the revolutions of policy which leave 
other institutions neither peace nor permanency. None of 
the remoter relations of men are yet settled; no other form 
of government in existence coincides with the laws of the 
human constitution; and there is no rest possible or desirable 
till external order and mental law are in perfect harmony. 

Experience., growing out of the blind necessities of society, 
has found and proved many particular truths, and practice 
appropriates them; but all past attainment in political policy 



METAPHYSICS. 145 

has been merely empirical. No true system has received and 
harmonized discoveries, and directed their modification in new 
uses. Nobody knows now, certainly, whether representative 
republicanism will answer the wants of Europe; nor is it 
likely that its own people will know with any greater 
assurance after they shall have tried it. Men and nations 
may blunder upon a truth, but if they find it by accident it 
will never grow into a principle. The experimental philoso- 
phy, rejecting, as it does, the light of final causes, is necessa- 
rily limited in its range to physical discovery. Incapable of 
induction a priori, and its facts all lying within the domain 
of the external senses, it has done nothing for Psychology, 
nor for anything in Education, Civil Law and Government, 
that depends upon spiritual science, and it never can — but, 
more of this anon. 

Religion rightly presides over morals, and should pre- 
scribe rules for all the relations of men ; but our political 
and ecclesiastical Protestantism, to make sure of the divorce 
of church and state, forbids the intrusion of the thought of 
• God into the theory of politics ; and the priesthood is as 
scrupulous to observe the prohibition, as if it really believed 
theocracy to be the worst sort of despotism. The church 
gives ns no system of society — social, industrial, or politi- 
cal. It prescribes particular virtues, and proscribes particu- 
lar vices in the direction of individual conduct ; but it 
declares that the JSew Testament does not teach politics, 
and it even accepts its own polity from the civil Govern- 
ment. It is as democratic in its prolonged protest against 
popes, as the republic is in its resistance to kings. The 
church takes care of worship, but allows the state to pre- 
scribe morals, and we have no help from that quarter. 

Mental Philosophy (technical), notwithstanding the natu- 
ral justice of its pretensions, is neither permitted to design 

T 



146 METAPHYSICS. 

the general plan of the social edifice, nor to govern any of 
its departments. Civil government builds itself upon pre- 
cedent, and is as shy of first principles as if they were the 
poetry of rebellion. 

Education, while it assumes to teach psychology as one 
of its hundred fragmentary sciences, nowhere gives any sign 
that it is itself governed by its supreme laws. 

Medicine has a few vague maxims about the connection 
and reciprocities of mind and body, but they are quite 
behind the facts of general experience, and are, besides, 
incapable of any practical application ; and 

Popular Sentiment mocks at the very name of meta- 
physics ! 

Generally, its topics are nowhere discussed, its doctrines 
are not understood or accepted, and even its terms of art 
are by nobody employed with any reference to their scien- 
tific value ; indeed, there are no words in the language 
whose signification is so uncertain as that half dozen or half 
score which constitutes the entire nomenclature of our men- 
tal philosophy. It seems not to have joaastered details 
enough to need a table of distinctive names, nor to have 
made its discoveries exact enough to require precise defini- 
tions. 

It is strange, very strange, when one comes to think of it, 
that the philosophy of the mind should have no effective 
existence among men ; that the sovereign life of the world 
should be without a theory recognized, or a set of principles 
accepted and employed in daily use ; and that, too ; after 
the assiduous investigations of five-and-twenty centuries of 
recorded labor. 

Fruitless of available results as this long toil has proved, 
it is yet the mind's instinct to work ever at the task of 
exploring its own nature and ascertaining its own laws. In 



METAPHYSICS. 14T 

a vague, uncertain way, Metaphysics has a sort of semi- 
sacred place among her sister sciences — the position of a 
dead child in a family. It has a mysterious existence some- 
where in the spirit-world, with a name to live in the 
material, and it is neither given up by the affections, nor 
entirely unrecognized among the actualities of busy life, but 
there is no plate set at the table, no chair in the social 
circle, and no work assigned it in the field. Its precocity 
and contemplative habits, its delicate thinness and bril- 
liancy, its dreamy earnestness, bordering upon delirium, yet 
full of the light of genius and the warmth of a higher life, 
are dwelt upon with a sort of reverence that is not reliance, 
and a mixture of tenderness and pity that has not quite the 
familiarity of affection. Opinion stands at a puzzle ; there 
is an idea that it must have got some incommunicable 
insight into something or other in its long reveries, too high, 
probably, for revelation, and too fine for use ; and the 
dreamer was therefore removed into the ethereal regions, 
because not fitted to rough it among the rude realities of 
the working world. 

Of necessity, political and social order are established in 
communities early in their progress toward civilization, and 
long before the laws of mind become the subjects of critical 
inquiry, those of conduct are somewhat digested ; just as 
languages are pretty well filled up before the rules of gram- 
mar are formally systematized. In both cases, fundamental 
laws tacitly preside over and direct the development, and 
drift it toward the symmetry of form which exact science 
afterwards bestows ; but the progress is made through the 
tortuous route of a blundering empiricism, and at the cost 
of much loss, and under the burden of much error perpetu- 
ated by authority of experience long after its age of 
ignorance has passed. 



148 METAPHYSICS. 

If practice should conform to principle, then the actual 
must rest upon the theoretical — the prescient thought must 
direct the evolution of dependent facts. 

Now, man, notwithstanding his large liberty, and the 
prodigious variety of his actions, is still a being of creation, 
and the subject of invariable laws — laws which arise out of 
his constitution, and determine all its movements. He is 
not the product of chance, nor the sport of caprice. He 
has a constancy of nature maintained through all change of 
conditions and relations ; and there must be a science of his 
constitution, a philosophy of his actions. The specific 
powers of the human soul are not, probably, more numerous 
than the elements of the surrounding world, to which they 
bear relation ; the phenomena of their workings are gene- 
rally quite as well exposed to observation as the properties 
of matter ; and for those things in the mental constitution, 
which will not objectively answer to inquiry, we have con- 
sciousness to reveal them ; so that over and above all our 
means of examining the outward world, already so well 
explored, we have this faculty accompanying every fact of 
psychical existence, and exposing it to reflection. 

But the necessity of this knowledge to the accomplish- 
ment of human destiny, absolutely demonstrates the possi- 
bility of its attainment, to the conviction of every mind that 
sees the dependency of ends upon means in the system of 
nature, and knows, also, the beneficent provision of means 
to those ends. 

Geology promises to render us the history of the earth, 
recorded in the hieroglyphs of rocks and fossil vestiges ; 
Astronomy is capable of its prophecy ; and Chemistry actu- 
ally invests us with the executive power of the material 
kingdom. The air, the earth and the ocean, are yielding 
their tribute richly to the sovereignty of mind. The know- 



METAPHYSICS. 149 

*• 

ledge which the sciences supply has step by step yielded its 
equivalent of administrative power over physical nature. 
All this has been attained by proceeding upon the simple 
apprehension, that all the differently endowed material sub- 
stances are under the government of positive law ; that 
each element is related to every other by affinities, whose 
action produces all the changes in nature ; that it is possi- 
ble to note, compare and arrange all the facts into the 
order of a certain system ; and that such just and thorough 
observation must at last put within the control of mind all 
the possibilities of matter, so that the entire system which 
came into existence in obedience to a word, and to manifest 
an idea, shall yield allegiance to the wisdom of that idea, 
wheresoever and by whomsoever it is displayed. 

Mind is a spiritual substance or being, and has the habi- 
tudes and obeys the laws of that manner of existence ; but 
it is adjusted (to answer the relations of a temporary life) 
to a material organization, and it is intimately interlinked 
with a complete material creation. Within the compass 
and sphere of these its instrumental activities and material 
relations it is clearly within the province of physical philo- 
sophy, and answerable to its methods. All its actions, 
affections, relations, manifestations, in and by material 
interventions, belong necessarily to the department of phy- 
sical science, and as such must be explored and cultivated, 
that it may yield the utilities of true and certain knowledge. 
There must be a science of mind equivalent to the chemistry 
of matter, if we would obtain power over the mental, similar 
to that within our reach over the material, world ; and we 
can neither meet its requirements, develop its agencies, nor 
comprehend its phenomena, while we refuse to know them 
as the subjects of those material and mechanical conditions 
on which their manifestation so clearly depends. Here, in 



150 METAPHYSICS. 

the outermost sphere of mental life, in all that is exposed to 
observation by the senses, in the region of the external 
experiences of the present life, it is the proper object of the 
Baconian system of philosophizing, the legitimate subject of 
its modes of exploration, and discoverable by no other. 

The school of thinkers who have given the present form 
to the doctrines of mind have done nothing for their subject 
that the mechanical philosophers have effected for theirs. 
They have given us no analysis of the mental constitution. 
They have not known that specific knowledge of its 
elements is either needed or attainable. With them, the 
mind is a force, an agent, or a function ; but whether it 
consists of numerous dissimilar parts and powers, having 
each its distinct endowments, or is a simple essence without 
parts, is neither settled nor esteemed of any importance in 
the inquiry ; jast as if it were undetermined in physics, 
whether matter is (according to the conception of the anci- 
ents of their materia prima) without qualities, properties, 
shape, or atomic constitution, or, embodied, as modern 
chemistry renders it, in some fifty or sixty distinct ele- 
ments. 

Not only its intimate character and constitution, but the 
facts of its instrumental connection with the body, are thrown 
out of consideration. Many vital actions are understood to 
depend upon the corporeal structure, but those which are 
concerned in the mental manifestations are wholly neglected. 
The material conditions are as entirely disregarded, as if 
the intelligent soul acted upon the surrounding universe 
per se I 

Analysis is, indeed, constantly spoken of in the books, but 
the word is borrowed from physical science, without any of 
its meaning, and it is put to no legitimate use; for example: 
the faculties of mind recognized are such as perception, con- 



METAPHYSICS. 151 

ception, memory, judgment, imagination, and attention. A 
moment's reflection will show that none of these are names 
for elementary parts or powers of the intellectual organization. 
They are obviously the names of so many states or modes of 
action of the elementary powers. They correspond to solu- 
tion, crystallization, combination, reaction, precipitation, and 
sublimation, in chemistry; but in no respect, and for no 
purpose, answer to its oxygen, nitrogen, potassium, and other 
results of its real analysis. Mental philosophy speaks only 
of processes under the names of powers., and faculties, and is 
just in the condition that the theory of matter w^ould be, if 
the gases, earths, metals, and imponderable bodies, were 
unknown or undistinguished, i. e., it is still looking at actions 
and results, and mistaking them for agents and powers. 
Attention is but a name for the active state of a power; 
Memory is the same act or state of a faculty which existed in 
Perception, but without the presence of the object; Percep- 
tion is not a faculty, but a mode of action of many diverse 
faculties ; like Judgment, which is a process in and by ele- 
mentary powers, as unlike as are their several objects, of 
which the qualities of a heroic poem, and of a whisky 
punch, give some idea of the possible variety and dissimilar- 
ity — and so of all the other misnamed faculties of the meta- 
physicians. 

The ancients knew nothing of the methods of the experi- 
mental philosophy, and they did not attempt its employment 
in any region of inquiry, physical or metaphysical. Modern 
inquirers into the mysteries of mind have constantly endeav- 
ored the solution of that which is above the province of the 
senses by the sensational method, and they have constantly 
neglected that department and region of research which is 
responsive to their manner of investigation; and the results 
have very naturally disgraced the effort 



152 METAPHYSICS. 

Gall and Spurzheim applied the experimental method to 
that department of mental life which lies in the sphere of 
material manifestation, with eminent success. They endeav- 
ored discovery by the employment of means adapted to their 
field of inquiry; but, as Bacon's philosophy was not 
acknowledged to be scientific by the metaphysicians for 
half a century after its publication, this application of it 
must probably wait as long for a recognition. 

The phrenologists, however, consider the mind only phe- 
nomenally, and exclusively as a department of physical phi- 
losophy. 

But there is, besides, a range of metaphysical science 
which lies quite out of the domain of the senses, a region of 
psychical experiences into which the mechanical philosophy 
cannot penetrate, and a class of processes, very real and 
very common, which are out of the reach of observation; 
moreover, intuitive truths are legitimate premises in the 
logic of this high sphere of thought, and its supreme laws 
and most influential relations are discoverable only by the 
a priori route of demonstration. 

The ancient philosophers tried to resolve the riddle of 
material existences by the means of those intuitions and 
hypothetical methods which are native and legitimate only 
in the world of mind. The moderns, dissatisfied with their 
substantial forms, materia prima, occult qualities and a priori 
method, have assaulted the spiritual world with the ponder- 
ous enginery of the material system, and endeavored to 
extend the jurisdiction of its compasses and plumb-line over 
the immaterial. The results are prodigious enough with- 
out being at all surprising ; but the world will be wiser 
and better before they will be fully recognized and reme- 
died. 

In the order of things, the material world was to be first 



METAPHYSICS. 153 

subdued ; and its philosophy has been long supreme. When 
that is well-nigh accomplished, the laws of spirit life will get 
themselves considered, and mind will be restored to its due 
supremacy of dominion and dignity. 



II. 



Physical and Metaphysical departments of mental science — Functions of the exter- 
nal senses limited to physical bodies and their properties — Perception is by 
internal senses — Ideas which the external senses cannot furnish, either in their 
elements or form — General or abstract ideas generated by the innate power of 
the intelleot — Instinct — Moral liberty— The results of mental action determined 
by a pre-established harmony — First principles and necessary truths instinctive 
— Standards of taste and morals — Educability — The mind descends by its intui- 
tions to the specialties of knowledge. 

In the first number of this series I took the ground that 
the science of mind divides naturally and necessarily into 
two departments, which I designated the Physical and Meta- 
physical, respectively. I will endeavor now to establish this 
division. It is not my purpose to define the boundary 
sharply, and assign to every particular fact and phenomenon 
within the compass of psychological science its appropriate 
place and relations, but only to exhibit and justify this divi- 
sion of the subject, and the correspondent differences of phi- 
losophic method required by these diverse departments of 
inquiry. 

In the discussion I will not carry with me the conscious- 
ness of all the controversies of all the schools, and address 
myself to them, as if everything must be proved against 
everybody. It is not feats of metaphysical gymnastics, but 
some earnest available work that I would perform. 

T* 



154 M ETAPHYS I CS. 

The mind of man holds certain determinate relations to 
the material universe. By means of appropriate parts 
of the body it is adjusted to this intercourse. Through the 
instrumentality of the external senses and the organs of 
voluntary motion it acts upon, and receives the action 
of, all physical things, and, whatever of mind is embodied 
around it. 

The five external senses are the known avenues through 
which specific knowledge of surrounding material things is 
admitted to the mind; but the organs of these senses have 
no perception of the things thus admitted. They minister 
intermediately to internal or intellectual senses by receiving 
impressions, and modifying and conveying them to those 
interior faculties whose function it is to translate the pictures, 
vibrations, and molecular motions into perceptions: these 
perceptions being as well distinguished from the sensations 
which occasion them as the instructed telegraphist is from 
those motions of the excited wires which he recedes and ren- 
ders into the symbols of thoughts and things. It is not the 
eyeball which perceives, for, though pictures of things be drawn 
upon the retina perfectly, as they may be in all instances of 
absorbing mental occupation, no cognition of the pictured 
object results. The same obtains with the ear in every one's 
experience. Persons deeply engaged in study or house affairs 
seldom hear the clock strike, though the vibrations certainly 
beat upon the drum of the ear every hour. Again: it is not 
the eyeball which perceives form, for instance, for the touch, the 
smell, the hearing, are just as capable of awakening the idea, 
when the eye is closed; and, memory can raise it quite as well 
as vision can produce it. Every one is conscious that he sees 
with his "mind's eye," when the body's is inactive or incapa- 
ble. The eyeball is but an optical instrument, and differs 
nothing in office from an artificial machine, except in its vital 



METAPHYSICS. 155 

connection with the mind. The same is true of the other 
external senses. 

The word sensation is, therefore, well restricted to those 
impressions of the living organism which are yet short of 
intellection. Perception properly means that act or state 
of the mind by which it has the conviction of the present 
existence of external material things: or, perception is the 
conversion of a sensation into an idea or notion — the tran- 
script of material things in the mind, and its primary and 
simplest apprehension of them. 

The office and power of the external senses being thus 
limited, they are capable of conveying from the outward 
world to the mind whatever represents bodies, their proper- 
ties and physical conditions and relations, but nothing else 
or more. Whatever is beyond the material and phenome- 
nal, is quite out of their reach, and is in no way responsive 
to their jurisdiction. 

Of those/ external things which the senses are conversant 
with, we, in common with the inferior animals, have percep- 
tions, ideas, or notions. But we have */ther ideas and 
notions, quite as clear and cogent, which are neither per- 
ceptions of bodies nor ideas of them, nor of their physical 
properties and relations — ideas which cannot be pictured 
even by the fancy in any sensible forms or colors, or under 
any of the conditions of bodies ; such as ; Wisdom, Ignor- 
ance, Verity, Justice, Cogitation, Virtue, Honesty, and their 
opposites, with a hundred others. These relative ideas 
obviously belong not to the world of corporeal sensation. 
They have neither body, form, nor motion, and they have no 
representatives either in image or action that sense can 
appreciate. 

The external senses are also incapable of impressions by 
incorporeal beings, if there are any such. God, the human 



156 METAPHYSICS. 

soul, spirits, are not revealable to them or by them. The 
senses cannot logically deny such existences ; they can only 
reply to inquiry by acknowledging their ignorance and 
incompetency. Such beings are not impossible, for they are 
conceivable, and they are not necessarily disaffirmed by any- 
thing that we do know. The senses cannot disprove 
anything by their ignorance and incapacity until it is 
demonstrated that all possibility lies within their embrace. 

Besides specific ideas of incorporeal beings, and relative 
ideas both of corporeal and incorporeal beings, which cannot 
either in form or in their elements enter the mind through 
the bodily organs, there are innumerable logical relations of 
things, involved in every process of thought, relied upon in 
every action of our lives, and verified by universal expe- 
rience, which can spring only from the innate activity of the 
mind itself, and of which the corporeal senses are wholly 
incapable. The idea of Causation — that familiar omnipo- 
tence which intimates the Infinite Efficiency to all intellects, 
with the force of a necessary truth — is an eminent instance 
of a logical idea, spontaneous and instinctive, which the 
senses can neither create nor receive, and which nothing in 
matter can either manifest or support. The conception 
that " everything must have a cause n is so far an instinct, 
that it comes before all reasoning, refuses the authority and 
declines the tribunal of reason, and must, in fact, like all 
first principles, be had before reasoning can begin. Yet, 
Power — the efficiency of blind force, and that of wisdom — 
is not cognizable by any sense. The idea is evolved within, 
in entire independence of all outward impressions. 

The classification of natural objects and the general con- 
ceptions of genus and species, are further instances. Ideas 
exactly correspondent to individuals may be admitted and 
imprinted by the senses, but the generic notion of fish, bird, 



METAPHYSICS. 15? 

beast, man, is not a copy of any possible observation. So, 
of a nation, commonwealth or corporation, considered as an 
artificial person. The eye receives the impressions of per- 
sons and individuals, and reports them in severalty to the 
mind ; but it cannot see the logical tie that binds them, nor 
can it comprehend them as one whole. All abstract or 
general ideas are generated within ; and they are not sum- 
maries of individuals ; for the reason that the individuals 
are merged, not combined, in them, and would not together 
produce them. Moreover, the pattern or general idea must 
be had before individuals can be aggregated under it. 

Nay, more : even in the region of Physics — in corporeal 
things and their qualities, which are the objects of sense — 
the mind is not dependent ; nor is it limited in materials to 
experience and observation. The artist's conceptions of 
form, symmetry, proportion, harmony, are inward revela- 
tions. Eye hath not seen, nor ear ever yet heard, the glory 
of form, color and melody which shall be revealed in him. 
The exemplars of his high conceptions exist nowhere in 
material forms. Art copies not matter but thought in its 
creations. 

There are, also, all the passions and affections proper. 
Of them we have the clearest intellectual apprehension. 
There is nothing more distinct than our ideas of them, sepa- 
rate from the feelings themselves. They lie well defined in 
the mind's eye as subjects both of memory and judgment. 
The ideas of them are present at our bidding when the 
paroxysms are not reproduced ; but none of the external 
senses can transmit the sentiments of gratitude, love, rever- 
ence, pity, pride, anger and hope. 

Whether the soul be immortal and whether there be any 
other spirits than those of men, there is a class of expe- 
riences which belong not to the material world which invest? 



158 METAPHYSICS. 

us. Probably enough, all beings are organized substances, 
but they are not all objects of these flesh and blood senses 
of ours. The mind is not the mere correlate of matter. 
Its powers are not merely co-extensive with surrounding 
corporeal things ; and its conceptions even of them are 
above them. It overpasses all their teachings — transcends 
all their intimations — " glorifies them into higher things 
than any of their highest." The senses take the impression 
of the forms, attitudes, motions of the creation, as an illite- 
rate man scans a book, but the soul rises to the inference 
and apprehension of wisdom, beneficence and power in the 
designing mind ; it presses through into the thought of the 
Infinite, and looks down, from the height of the real and the 
absolute, upon the actual, as in the slow procession of the 
ages it feebly and imperfectly unfolds itself into the facts of 
experience. 

These dominant ideas, which are nothing other than modi- 
cations of the intellect, are not less real than the modifica- 
tions of matter ; they are otherwise manifested, but they 
are facts of equal validity, and they rest upon evidence, 
and offer demonstration, at least equally sure. What is 
there in hard, or soft, or round or square, more real than in 
cause and effect, art and wisdom? These powers are effi- 
cient in the most momentous phenomena of nature and 
human life ; yet they are but relations and aptitudes of 
things one to another, and to certain ends. As facts, they 
are not discovered or established by the action or the 
evidence of the senses. They are of another sphere ; they 
bear relation to the agencies of nature — the senses lie on 
the level of its passive materials. 

If any one replies, " The impressions of sense as materials 
are elaborated by the mind into the higher general concep- 
tions which we have of things f notwithstanding their total 



METAPHYSICS. 159 

inadequacy, I do not feel concerned to contradict him for 
any other reason than that which respects the symmetry of 
science ; because the pattern and guiding thought or idea, 
by which these elaborating processes must be conducted, 
remains to be accounted for. To illustrate : It has been 
said that the statuary gathered and blended " the pride of 
every model and the perfection of every master in one chef 
cVotuvre of art" in the creation of the Venus de Medici?. 
But whence came the presiding and directing architectural 
conception, which selected the separate beauties and built 
them into unprecedented perfection — whence the ideal that 
stood model in the artist's mind for that transcendent work ? 
The types even of physical perfection are in the soul — the 
standard of the material is in the immaterial ; and mind is 
the measure and mould of matter. 

In morals, obviously, the light within is not born of the 
darkness without. The demands of conscience are ever 
above the facts of experience, and its code of laws has not 
been gathered from the world's life, for it ever judges it. 
• Are these ideas, which experience can neither achieve 
nor attain to, innate, as philosophers understand the word ; 
or directly inspired, as certain religionists teach ? We are 
not driven to the choice of either of these opinions. 

On the assumption that the mind is an assemblage of 
faculties, numerous, dissimilar, and mutually related — each 
adapted to a special office, governed by fixed laws, and 
intrinsically active, we can easily enough get a solution of 
the question presented. 

An hypothesis consistent with all the facts of a series, and 
harmonizing with all related truth, is true. (Harmony is 
truth.) The following conception is offered in the belief 
that it will justify itself under this rule. 

Every faculty, whether concerned with bodies and their 



160 METAPHYSICS. 

qualities, with abstract speculation, or, with the emotions 
and passions which arise out of our social relations — if it has 
its own determinate nature and method, its action, however 
excited, must necessarily drift or tend toward certain results, 
and produce them in proportion to the degree, and other 
modifications, of its activity. If, for instance, a faculty is 
given for the conception of the idea of form (not the passive 
reception merely of a picture of it) then— just as we find the 
fact to be — whenever that faculty is excited to act, concep- 
tions of forms will arise, and its action will not depend upon 
the presence of any outward material body to awaken it. 
It will be accomplished in memory, reverie, or dream, as 
well and as certainly as in the presence of an object which 
can render its image through the senses. We have but to 
assume that this power of conceiving form is a member of 
the mental apparatus, which will produce its own kind of 
thought, however its activity is prompted, and, we have the 
generation of ideas, independently of all corporeal elements 
and suggestions, sufficiently provided for. The animal 
instincts will serve well for illustration. Hunger determines 
to all the actions which satisfy the want. Anger and Fear 
in this respect are like it. Arouse the passion, no matter 
how, it will work in a certain way and produce accordant 
results. There are other instincts which each in its own 
way modifies the life. Some of them involve processes and 
conceptions identical with what we call reasoning; as the 
instinct to build, to build in particular localities, and in special 
modes, which displays thought either in the animal, or in its 
Maker, or in both. These powers and tendencies are, evident- 
ly, so many springs, impelling their subjects to correspondent 
modes of action; and they need no previous education for 
their work. The impulse from within unfolds its inevitable 
results. It is nothing to the purpose to answer that these 



METAPHYSICS. 161 

are blind, unintelligent instincts working in ignorance alike 
of their cause and ends. In all respects which concern our 
argument, we have similar conditions of the higher and freer 
faculties to account for, and the same ends to reach. If the 
instincts of animals are rigidly and intimately guided by the 
thoughts of God. perhaps, the higher and freer faculties of 
Man are destined to an ultimate conformity, and are con- 
trolled, only with a little less of concurrent exactitude, by 
the law of a preestablished harmony between all agencies 
and all ends. 

The freedom of the intellectual functions, it must be 
observed, relates not to their manner of working, nor to the 
effects which result from a given amount of activity in 
them. The Creator has prescribed the law of their action, 
and holds them ever in their appointed offices. If the reflect- 
ive powers are active, inductive or analogical reasoning, not 
mnsic or covetousness, will result from that activity. Mind 
has a constant constitution, and to regard it in certain res- 
pects as a piece of complex mechanism, will help us to an 
•accurate apprehension of it. Some of its powers which lie 
closest about the roots of the animal life are deprived, in a 
great degree, of freedom — of the freedom to act or repose at 
will. The imminent necessity of their service fastens upon 
them the condition of bond slaves of the body. The rule of 
will or choice among the higher and remoter powers is freer 
and wider, but the kind of work that each power will do is 
beforehand determined. In the application, and in the 
degree of activity, of the higher faculties there is liberty, but 
none that can change the specific nature and character of 
their actions. The reflective powers being excited look for 
causes and find them, as naturally as hunger suggests food, 
and as certainly as the migratory impulse sends the pigeon 
southward in his season through the pathless air, without 



162 METAPHYSICS. 

experience and without instruction. The idea of cause is 
not born in, but it is nevertheless instinctive. The corporeal 
life is protected by making its instincts irresistible. The 
mental life is secured by making the conception of first 
principles and necessary truths inevitable. To this extent 
and end "He lighteth every man that cometh into the 
world/ 7 and in this way "the life is the light of men." 

In the human bosom are planted the varied capabilities 
of the animal, rational, and moral nature, and the stimulants 
of life unfold each toward maturity in its own kind, as sun- 
shine and moisture excite the germs of vegetation into their 
variegated beauty and manifold forms of use. 

It is not wonderful, however intricate the process, that a 
rude piece of timber thrown into a machine shall drop out a 
gun-stock complete, if the wheels, planes, and chisels are set 
and worked exactly to the pattern. There is the fact, and 
the reason of it, and all puzzle about it is only a confession of 
ignorance or willful inattention. The thing is admirable 
indeed, but the admiration is due to the designing mind. 
All else is plain enough. We may indulge our w r onder to 
any extent, which will not confuse our thoughts, at the 
mechanism of mind. But if it had a maker, and he had a 
purpose, it is plain enough that he w r ould address it to that 
purpose by giving every varied power its required capacity 
and a determinate adjustment to its specific function. There 
is freedom enough left for all actual and possible weal and 
woe, for all just praise and blame, in leaving the direction, 
the degree of activity, and the combinations of movement 
among the several powers, to our choice. 

There is everything in the instinctive and spontaneous action 
of the souPs higher powers that is required for their ultimate 
attainment to perfection and harmony with themselves, 
with nature, and with the creative mind; but nothing which 



METAPHYSICS. 163 

shall at every step of every process insure their wisest appli- 
cation and most perfect action, as in the case of the animal 
instincts. They are not, like these, conducted by the over- 
ruling purpose, in measure and form, to their ultimate end. 
Accident, choice, will, or what you will, determines the 
degree of their effort, and the direction of their application, 
and the misapplied and the partial are accepted for the cor- 
rect and complete, and so they fall into the false. Thus, 
revenge will seem justice, if only the immediate parties and 
the injury are regarded. The circle of reasoning here is 
regular, round, and conclusive. Every faculty involved 
works true to its constitution, within the range which it 
takes, but, that is not broad enough to embrace all the 
facts and truths really concerned, and so, the conclusion is 
false to all the elements which are excluded, and, to the 
universal truth. 

The difficulty of finding a standard for beauty and even 
for morals is because, the true standard is only in the mind 
of the highest endowed in these things respectively, and, 
because, that absolute highest has never yet been and never 
can be manifest. Just because the highest truths are not 
yet in the actual, but still in advance of, and beyond, expe- 
rience — unrevealed in the possible — just because the limits 
of attainment are not yet reached, the measure of the just 
and perfect is not known. The definite proportionals of 
chemical combination demonstrate their highest conditions 
in crystalline 'completeness. Their ultimate is reached and 
known. But the for ever unfolding future of spirit must be 
led forward by a measure of the true and the right, above 
and beyond every stage of achievement. The true rule 
cannot be gathered from the record of attainment; it must 
be revealed by the most perfect mind. To moral perfection 



164 METAPHYSICS. 

we look for moral law, and to the highest in every depart- 
ment of thought, for the law of its subjects. 

But all progress, and capability of it, imply that the 
ideas by which advancement is to be made must come, 
not from the region of the known, but from the unknown 
into which it leads. Receptivity is necessarily in advance 
of attainment, and no one can receive anything who has not 
already its kind. A dog cannot be taught philosophy, nor 
a sheep devotion; the general idea must receive the parti- 
cular — the abstract comprehends the actual. The mind 
descends from universals into the specialties of knowledge. 
The sacred science of no people under the sun infers its 
Divinity from particular truths, but prescribes truths coin- 
cident with their intuitions of a God. The old is not 
expanded into the new: we are ever capable of more than 
all that we have, and so, growth in knowledge and goodness 
is secured to all, even to the highest. 

I have nowhere intimated that the specialties of the 
knowledge of material things can be had independently of 
the senses — that, for instance, ai blind man can know colors 
— but I will not now anticipate objections and misapprehen- 
sions. 

In my next I will gather up some of the loose ends of 
this, and give them a focal direction, and will endeavor 
the demonstration of these assumptions on another field of 
argument. 



METAPHYSICS. 165 



III. 

Instinctive and rational life, their resemblance of nature and necessities, and 
their differences — Similar ends effected in both by similar powers — Man has not 
invented any part of his own nature — Only general ideas and feelings are intui- 
tive ; the specific are determined by associated faculties — Reason knows causes 
and sequences, but the religious instinct apprehends and individualizes God and 
a spiritual hierarchy — Every faculty authoritative in its own sphere — Divine 
Revelations proceed upon the assumption and recognize the fact that the idea 
of God is intuitive and not logical or demonstrative — All the other faculties, ani- 
mal and rational, modify the formal conception — The necessity of a priori 
knowledges and affections to the development of our nature, in harmony with 
the general system and the designing Mind — The universal truth and goodness 
are the type and standard of thought and feeling in all orders of sentient beings. 

I have said that some of those ideas which we have by 
the action of our higher intellectual and moral faculties are 
spontaneous and intuitive — that those first principles and 
primary emotions which are elementary, essential, and com- 
mon in all thought and action, are not logical or demonstra- 
tive, but instinctive. I have likened them to those instincts, 
commonly so called, by which the actions of the inferior 
animals are automatically directed. Such direction must 
be provided for the infancy and necessary inexperience and 
incapacity both of the rational and irrational races. If, for 
instance, the appetite for food, and the art of securing it, 
adaptation of element and locality to the life, with the cau- 
tion, cunning and courage which guard it, were not divinely 
provided and adjusted in their instant activities to the 
necessities of every moment, the scheme of creation in every 
department of sentient existence would utterly fail. 

The instincts of animals are, indeed, a kind of mechanism 
by which the purpose of their existence is certainly accom- 
plished; but their life is not without its modicum of liberty, 



166 METAPHYSICS. 

for their actions are impelled by motives and directed 
by knowledges, and they vary their actions according to 
circumstances, within their own limited range of choice, as 
men do, and as advantageously. In truth, we differ from 
them, not by universal unlikeness, but by the greater num- 
ber of faculties which we possess, by the higher nature of 
those which are proper to humanity, and, by the consequent 
greater freedom of all. 

Human nature repeats and reproduces all the powers of 
all the inferior animals, and, superadds its own that are 
peculiar. The faculties which are common to men and ani- 
mals are very numerous. Let us indicate a few: The func- 
tions of the five senses, which are alike wherever they are 
found; the instinct of intersexual love, which is quite 
general; marriage for life or exclusive attachment, as in the 
fox and dove; gregariousness or societary organization, as 
in the bee; love and care of offspring; fear, cunning, cour- 
age, music; perception, cognition, memory, and judgment 
of the physical properties of surrounding things; under- 
standing of the passions of their own kind, and of similar 
passions in other animals and in men; and in some of them, 
a devotion to their human masters that might be called the 
religion of instinct, but that the worshiper is not made in 
the image of the worshiped, and is not capable of growing 
into likeness of life and character. 

Now all these faculties, and the ideas and capabilities 
which we have by them, come to us under the same laws 
and conditions, and answer to the same ends, as in the ani- 
mal world. In us, as in them, the primitive impulses and 
intuitive knowledges w r hich rule and direct the life that is 
common to all the sentient races, are before and above all 
instruction, experience, and capacity of reflection. 

But the whole of humanity was as certainly and necessa- 



METAPHYSICS. 167 

rily fore-ordained by a competent intelligence; and men 
have not invented for themselves any of their elementary 
faculties. The sentiment of parental love was given to the 
human, race, as to the lower orders, and the feeling and the 
idea do not, in the one case any more than in the other, 
depend for their existence upon the intellectual perception 
of the beauty, utility, and necessity of such an instinct. 
The same is true of conscience, hope, benevolence, faith in 
and w r orship of, the supernatural. We have these also by 
constitutional provision, and we owe the feelings and ideas 
to which we give these names to instinctive impulse. But 
conscience, as nature furnishes it, is not a code; the impulse 
to believe and worship things which the senses cannot appre- 
hend, is not digested into a creed; nor is the simple senti- 
ment of benevolence formed into a policy of philanthropic 
enterprises. Like so many springs of the moral mechanism 
they lie coiled up within us, to supply, each its specific kind 
of energy and action to the general life; but the special 
direction and ultimate manifestation will be determined by 
all the causes which influence human agency. General 
conceptions and tendencies only are secured by the mental 
organization. The particular ideas and feelings of actual 
experience are left free to form themselves within these 
outlines, under the laws which govern the contingencies of 
rational existence. Conscience gives the general idea that 
there is right, with the feeling which executes particular 
judgments in self-approval or remorse; but it does not 
supply the standard of those judgments. The instinct of 
supernaturality assumes the existence of beings that live 
independently of material forms, and the particular doctrines 
of angels, demons, and deities are received into this general 
conception, but axe not specifically shaped and exactly 
determined by it. So the sentiment of benevolence gushes 



168 METAPHYSICS. 

out like a fountain from the bosom of the earth, but its 
particular channels and effects are determined by ulterior 
influences. Thus, justice, mercy and faith are given; but, 
"to do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly before God" 
depends, for all practical conditions and ultimate results, 
upon all the circumstances which modify human actions. 
Only those general conceptions and tendencies are thus 
intrinsic which ascertain to what class of beings we belong, 
and the destiny toward which the general current of our 
life shall necessarily drift. Within these limits the actual 
history of individuals will be infinitely varied. 

This theory of the mental constitution assumes the exis- 
tence of as many unlike kinds of faculty in the mind as 
there are unlike species of ideas and feelings in human 
experience; it ascribes the production of every kind of idea 
to its appropriate faculty, exclusively, and, attributes all 
general a priori conceptions to the spontaneous action of 
their appropriate faculties. It refuses the origin of the 
religious sentiments to the reflecting powers. To them 
belong the primary conception of causation, and the appre- 
hension of all specific causes; but it is the sentiment of 
worship that impersonates and individualizes a God. The 
self-evident truth that everything must have a cause, which 
the inductive faculty teaches, can lead neither mind nor 
heart up to the first cause; the series of links in this logical 
chain finds no end, and rests in no beginning, but rather 
denies it. It is the religious instinct which lodges it in a 
conscious uncaused First cause. 

Since the inauguration of the mechanical philosophy, 
metaphysical theorists have been endeavoring to derive all 
general ideas from the particular ones which they seem to 
include. In the field of physical experiment items and 
atoms are painfully gathered into aggregates, and general 



METAPHYSICS. 169 

inductions are made from special instances. Observing 
that mental activity in childhood begins, in point of time, 
with the perception of external material things, and that 
practical knowledge is conquered only by patient observa- 
tion and thorough experience, they hastily conclude that 
the most general conceptions, or abstract ideas, of every 
kind, must be somehow elaborated from the most particular; 
and so, the external senses come to be the only orthodox 
inlets of truth to the mind. Locke taught that all ideas of 
reflection are derived from ideas of sensation, and so laid 
the foundation of the grossest form of materialism. Under 
the rule of this system, whatever opinion or feeling could 
not justify itself by the judgment of sense was condemned, 
and life and spirituality perished out of philosophy, and 
even religion grew shy of its vital assumptions. 

It was a very bad logical blunder to make any one mental 
faculty do the proper work of another, as it would be to employ 
the eye to hear with, or the foot in the office of the hand. 
To ascribe the religious sentiment to the reasoning faculty, 
and try its truth by the testimony of reason, was indeed 
unmatched in error and mischief, until an equal absurdity 
was achieved in the philosophy of the senses. The visible 
and tangible forms of things were observed to differ, and as 
it is true that only the tangible corresponds to the occupa- 
tion of space by natural objects, metaphysicians drew the 
conclusion that the touch modifies the function of sight, and 
rectifies its impressions. A straight stick, thrust obliquely 
into water appears to the eye bent at the surface of the 
water, while the touch is not so deceived; but it is plain 
that the vision is not thereby corrected, as it is said to be, 
for the most enlightened philosopher will see it still just as 
much bent as will the most ignorant child. It is indeed, 
very absurd to suppose that any faculty, sensitive, affective, 

8 



170 METAPHYSICS. 

or reflective, can take the place and perform the function 
of any other; each was appointed to minister to the general 
end in its own way, and no other is employed or permitted, 
by the laws of our constitution, to replace it. The eye is 
not untrue in its own office because the touch takes a differ- 
ent impression in particular circumstances. When a hawk 
strikes his prey in the air, vision measures distance and 
direction perfectly where touch can give it no aid and no 
previous instruction; moreover, the eye distinguishes colors 
which the finger is utterly incapable of. Every faculty is 
properly addressed to its own office, aud must not be sub- 
jected to the incompetent criticism of any other. Reason 
has no just authority against the teachings of feeling: our 
loves' and hates must not ask its leave to be; though they 
should accept its light in the manner of their action. Intel- 
lect did not discover emotion; reason did not produce fear, 
or anger, or gratitude, or pity, or devotion, or remorse, or 
hate; and how can it nullify either of them without stultify- 
ing itself. a 

It results that every kind of feeling is the function of a 
special faculty — that each bears a divine warrant for its 
own exercise, and, that the existence of each argues the 
existence of a correlate object, and either proves it or dis- 
proves all design in the creation. 

Whatsoever is positive in our mental structure corresponds 
to and implies something real in related existence; as the 
eye-ball intimates light, and the lungs, air. 

The fact that the intellect does not and cannot generate 
the general idea of divinity and of a spiritual hierarchy, is 
the reason why neither the Jewish nor Christian Scriptures, 
nor indeed, the oracles of any other revelation, that is either 
true or probable, attempt the logical demonstration of those 
first principles of religion : " In the beginning God 



METAPHYSICS. 171 

made" There! the assumption of a divinity, in its 

own proper self-reliant majesty, is addressed with authority 
to the expectant instinct of worship in humanity; and the 
didactics of the theological system, occupied with the speci- 
fic attributes and administrative functions of the Deity, are 
steadily restrained from arguing his existence. 

A pretended revelation attempting a logical demonstra- 
tion of the being of God would doubly ignore its own claims 
to credit — for it would address faculties incapable of the 
proof, and so disprove its alleged divinity, and it would be 
ignorantly attempting that by indoctrination which already 
exists by intuition, and can be had by no other means. 

The faculties which relate us to supernatural beings give 
us our properly religious ideas and conceptions, but the 
intellect, with the moral feelings and the propensities, modi- 
fies and forms them in particulars. Our Divinity will take 
the character of everything in our humanity. The God of 
a just, benevolent, and affectionate man is a very different 
being from that of a revengeful, austere religionist. Oracles 
and sacred books, however reverently received, will not 
secure uniformity of apprehension; they will more or less 
modify the conception, but under the general law every 
creature brings forth after his own kind, and the intellect is 
so little adequate to the original production of this great 
idea that it has, in fact, less influence upon it than any pas- 
sion or propensity of our animal nature. The impulses which 
generated the mythology, of Greece are active in every age 
and under every form of faith. 

The necessity, and therefore the existence, of such a 
■priori general ideas in the intellectual and higher moral 
and religious faculties as our theory assumes and affirms, is 
further apparent from these considerations: — 

Human nature is put under the law of indefinite develop- 



172 METAPHYSICS. 

ment. The mind is not brought into being in the full 
maturity of its powers; its end and beginning are not 
joined in stereotyped perfectness of capacity and action; — 
it has a future stretching ever forward into the infinite and 
it claims eternity and the universe for its sphere and range. 
In the endless and boundless unknown it must be directed 
by the light of such certainties of knowledge, and such 
tendencies of affection, as rule in the system to which it 
belongs. It must have capacities adapted, and activities 
correspondent, to the scheme of things which lies in the 
scope of its relations and experiences; and it must carry 
with it for impulse and direction as much of the universal 
love and truth as will ultimately achieve its own destiny; or 
else, the highest parts of the creation are left to organize 
lawless confusion into order, without light, power, or deter- 
minate drift! A state of things, conceivable only of a 
chaos, but absolutely impossible in a creation. 

Unity of the supreme power, unity of the general system 
of existence, imply impulses and attractions in every atom 
and every agent which shall at all events achieve the grand 
design of the universe. If the animal must be born fully 
provided for the limited range of its routine life; if the 
faculties which are conversant only with the facts of 
physical being, which lie within the immediate reach of the 
sensitive organs, need to be furnished with powers and 
appetencies w r hose apprehensions answer truly, without pre- 
vious instruction or experience, to the facts of their exist- 
ence, much more do those powers and tendencies of high 
humanity need to be furnished with divine instinct, 
impulse, and guidance, whose appointed office it is to com- 
prehend all the truth of fact and principle in nature, and to 
feel the sympathies and reciprocate the loves of the whole 
conscious creation, and know and enjoy the Creator for ever. 



METAPHYSICS. 173 

The understanding must be fitted to apprehend causes and 
relations, just as they stand in the omniscient philosophy; 
and the affections and sentiments must go out after their 
objects with the regards which the creative purpose assigns 
to them by the laws of universal harmony. For how else 
than by such previous adjustment, even in the constitution 
of the individual, could the demands of selfishness be bal- 
anced by the concessions of benevolence — the instincts 
which cherish the life, with the impulses which devote it to 
the race — and, the relishes of appetite with the luxuries of 
the soul — in such symmetry, self-adjustment, and unity of 
action and end ? 

The harmonies of relation which traverse the whole crea- 
tion and accomplish its unity are effected by the cotrespond- 
ences distributed throughout the various orders of being. 
Each class or kind is adapted and adjusted to all that is 
below, and around, and above, it, by characters common to 
all. Our union with our own race is in possibility exact 
and perfect. The less nobly endowed species are associated 
and harmonized with us in those things in which they have 
likeness of nature. To the extent of the parallelism and 
correspondence unity is secured, and, there is no antagonism 
in that in which we transcend them: we only depart from, 
and do not conflict with, them, for all in us which excels 
them is at harmony with all in us that resembles them, 
and, therefore, with them also. In like manner, our union 
with all that is higher than we is limited to the points in 
which we resemble them ; and beyond there is no conflict, 
for there is nothing to oppose. 

For all the purposes of coherence in the general system 
of being — for all the necessities of the general government, 
and, to effect that ultimate harmony which the completed 
plan of Divine Wisdom supposes— our intellectual action 



174 METAPHYSICS. 

must be determined in essential correspondence with the 
universal truth, and our affections must be impelled into 
substantial conformity with the all-pervading goodness. 
Right and wrong, truth and falsehood, good and evil, must 
be recognized in all worlds. From centre ta circumference 
of sentient being thought must answer to the attractions of 
divine truth, and feeling have polarity to the Divine good- 
ness — the broad basis of all knowledge must be laid in 
intuitive truths inwoven with the very texture of the intel- 
lect, and emotion must be trained upon the framework of 
the universal loves. 

Right may be confused with wrong in form and ultimate 
fact, but in essence it must be, and be felt to be, antagonis- 
tic, else all appeals to it must be unavailing for development 
and for duty; and good must be distinguished from evil, and 
have constancy of character, or all discipline of reward and 
punishment must utterly fail; and there could be no reliance 
in legislation, no calculation upon conduct, no science of 
character. The mental and moral constitution, to be the 
subject of a uniform and permanent moral law, must be as 
stable and constant as the organic anatomy, which is found 
to be identical in the Egyptian mummy and the latest 
born individual of the race. This can be obtained in detail 
only by ideas and feelings fundamentally alike in all; and 
the actual uniformity seems explicable only by the assump- 
tion that they are imbued by creation into the functions 
of the soul, and are so far the transcript and image 
of the Divine wisdom and love. All of which is only saying 
that the Infinite Providence has not taken care to feed the 
birds and clothe the lilies, yet utterly abandoned the noblest 
part of all his works to the blind hazards of chance. 

The liberty in human agency, and its compatibility with 
determinateness of nature and the government of constitu- 



MET APHY S I C S . 175 

tional law, will receive special attention in its convenient 
place. We must prepare the way for this and kindred 
questions by first settling that of mental analysis and organic 
instrumentality, or, The physical department of mental 
philosophy. 



IV. 

Mind manifested during this life wholly through the material organism — Such inter- 
course of spirit with spirit as establishes the unitary order of creation excepted — 
The natural reaches into the supernatural, a presumption of science — The body's 
functions subordinate in different degrees to the mind — The phenomena of the 
mind subject to the laws of the body — Mind has perception as well as sensation 
through the organism — Immortality and nature of the soul not involved in the 
physiological inquiry — Manifestation not a measure of the soul's intrinsic power. 

The soul during this life is manifested only through and 
by the organism of the body. To observation and experi- 
ence its activities seem to depend upon the material 
machinery. To the senses, and whatever of knowledge we 
have by them, mind has no existence separate from matter, 
and no other capacities or powers than those which are 
exhibited by the corporeal instruments ; or, the body is to 
the soul what a musical instrument is to the performer — its 
means of expression and medium of manifestation. 

I do not say that all the faculties of the soul, and all the 
actions of every faculty, depend upon material conditions, 
and that there is nothing within us which is above the 
sphere, and independent of the laws, of materialism ; for a 
negation so broad as this would be unphilosophical in spirit, 
and very improbable in fact. The faith of the enlightened, 
and the superstition of the ignorant, all the world over and 
all its history through, are arrayed against it ; and the pre- 



1T6 METAPHYSICS. 

sumptions of science, even the science summoned by skep- 
ticism, strongly corroborate the assumptions of faith. 

We have the analogies of nature for the probability of 
powers which can pierce into the province of the spiritual, 
even while, in the main, they are limited by the laws of 
the material life. Every class of beings, which we know, 
possesses a shade of that which is the proper characteristic 
of the class next above it. The mineral and vegetable 
worlds blend, so as to bridge over their difference and dis- 
tance, by transitions which obliterate the marks of separa- 
tion ; the vegetable and animal natures are confused; where 
they border, by mutual overlappings — every species of 
each of these great kingdoms of natural beings mingles 
with that which is first above it by intrusive overreachings 
that fill up the gulfs which definition would put between 
kinds and degrees. Classes flow into each other by partici- 
pation of properties, and so creation is linked into unity, 
from atoms up to archangels. Between centre and cen- 
tre of adjacent groups the difference of kinds is obvious, 
as the interval between the crests of waves, but where they 
meet they are indistinguishably blended. Throughout 
nature, structure with structure and function with function 
interchange where they separate, and embrace as they depart, 
and the unbroken harmonies of the universe answer to the 
oneness of its origin and end. If plants are made sensitive 
that the proximate modes of life may mingle at their mar- 
gins — if the domestic and half-reasoning animals are lifted 
into intercourse with us by an educability above the limita- 
tions of instinct, it is egregiously illogical to deny, and to 
deny positively, that our race is endowed with something of 
that which is immediately above its rank — something lowest 
in that which is above us, and highest in us. It is flatly 
unphilosophical to say that our present and future, this 



METAPHYSICS. 1*7 

material and that spiritual, are divided by a yawning chasm 
of incongruity — that the law of intrusion or anticipation 
fails first where the material brinks upon the immaterial — 
that the mineral may ascend into the vegetable, and the 
vegetable into the animal, and every species aspire to parti- 
cipation with its superior, and, that aspiration is first for- 
bidden and a-cension first arrested where they become most 
noble and most necessary ! At the top of this climax ; in 
the full sweep of this accumulated tide ; up in the range 
of existence where the law of progress has become a habit 
of nature, and reached the noblest of all its subjects, it is 
impossible that creation should suddenly lose its instincts, 
and the wisdom of design start aside from its consistency 
of drift. It is not probable that all the light which comes 
to us from the higher life suffers the refraction of this dense 
material medium ; and some of that upper-world liberty 
seems even indispensable amid the disabling limitations of 
this life. The supernatural (if unity of scheme pervades 
the universe) is only a higher natural, and the material and 
spiritual must mingle where they meet. 

In affirming the dependency of mind upon the material 
organization during the present life, therefore, this point is 
reserved, and the mechanical philosophy is received, to this 
extent, under protest. 

But the truth and all the truth concerning this instru- 
mental connection and its incidents is not outranked in 
importance by any department of the great subject. The 
soul inhabits the body, and all the parts of the body answer 
to its offices in orderly relation and dependency. There can 
be no part of the structure without a function necessary to 
the whole, though the greatest diversity of relations between 
the several parts and the whole necessarily exists in a struc- 
ture so complex in constitution and use. Some organs of 

8* 



178 METAPHYSICS. 

the body are incessant in their activity ; some come into 
use at regular but somewhat distant periods : and others are 
inactive for years together. Some of the offices of the 
organs terminate in the maintenance of the machinery only 
— they are but the servants of servants ; others are the 
immediate instruments of the mind. 

It is well known that the mental faculties are attached to 
the physical organization, and their philosophy is, thus far, 
a department of physiology. Such of them as are con- 
cerned with the things " which do appear," are regulated by 
laws and subject to changes, exactly correspondent to those 
of the corporeal fabric. The conditions of infancy, maturity, 
and old age ; of health and disease ; of vigor and debility ; 
of habit, necessity, and liberty ; and of alternate activity 
and repose, are as distinctly marked upon the intellect and 
affections as upon the bodily frame. The same words are 
used interchangeably concerning the states and accidents of 
both, and the affections of either are instantly translated 
into correspondent changes in the other. 

The feeling that there is something in mind which matter 
cannot measure — that thought and emotion are very unlike 
the substances which digestion and secretion produce, and 
have no parallel in the mechanical movements of the body, 
has induced the error of altogether neglecting the organism 
in the study of mental science. Besides, mental philosophy 
was cultivated for ages before the functions of the body 
generally, and especially those of the nervous system, were 
even tolerably known ; and its doctrines took their general 
shape, and the study its method, while as yet human physi- 
ology was incapable of affording its assistance, or of assert- 
ing its claims to consideration. And, beside these causes 
the divorce of mind from matter in technical contemplation 
may have been still further effected by the at>prehension 



METAPHYSICS. 119 

that the doctrine of immortality would be endangered, if 
the offices of mind were considered in any respect subject 
to the laws of its physical instruments. This objection is 
not valid. If thought and emotion are very unlike bile and 
saliva ; if feeling and fancy can have nothing in common 
with substances elaborated from articles of diet ; it must be 
noticed, that the doctrine of the brain's instrumentality in 
the mental phenomena does not intimate that mind is a 
secretion or product of the nervous apparatus. !No such 
analogy is affirmed, and the doctrine is not responsible for 
any such resemblance between the nutritive and the intellec- 
tual functions. Digestion and assimilation build up the 
body and keep it in repair, as an instrument of the mind, 
and voluntary motion is among its capabilities of duty ; but 
it is to some action of the perfected instrument that we 
look for analogies to reconcile our reason to the alleged phy- 
siological connection ; and we find them in sufficient force 
in the offices of sensation. The eye is capable of the first 
degree of affection by external objects which is ultimately 
.resolved into perception and cognition — the ear receives 
vibrations and effects the first of those changes which ulti- 
mate in the felt pleasure of music. If these satellites of 
the sensorium commune are thus capable of the earliest trans- 
mutations of physical impressions into intellectual affections, 
it is not difficult to admit that the brain is the seat and 
centre and instrument of completed perception. 

To say that matter cannot think is to say nothing to the 
purpose ; the allegation is, that mind manifests thought, as 
it is admitted to see and hear, through and by certain parts 
of the body, and in the closest dependency upon the laws 
and conditions of the structure. Of this there is such 
proof as — invariable feebleness of intellect and feeling 
during the feebleness of infancy, disease, and old age — 



180 METAPHYSICS. 

the aberrations of mind and morals under the influence of 
narcotics, the excitement of fever, and such violence as dis- 
turbs the healthy functions of the brain — and, the apparent 
loss of mental and organic life together, in temporary sus- 
pensions, and in the final extinction, of the latter. 

The other objection arising upon the supposed danger to 
the immortality of the soul is of little account. It is not 
this doctrine but that of the objector, which makes the souPs 
existence to depend upon its supposed nature. It is enough 
to say that this inquiry does not involve its substance, 
quality, or duration, nor in any wise affect its destiny, but 
merely the conditions imposed upon it by its connection 
with the body. Whether the soul is adamant or ether, or 
that which is meant by the word spirit, is here of no conse- 
quence. If a seraph were incarnated the capabilities of 
flesh would limit his powers of action and passion here, and 
his angelhood would be temporarily levelled to our humanity. 
All excess of power, all transcendency of nature, would be 
restrained of display, just as the conceptions of musical 
harmonies are limited in their utterance by the capabilities 
of the instrument that must produce them. And just as in 
the case of the musician, his powers are not measured by 
the music produced, so of the human soul : by means of 
this body, in this life, it can accomplish so much, and is liable 
to such changes, as we witness, but what are its intrinsic capa- 
bilities and liabilities beyond all this " doth not yet appear." 

The disabilities of the first childhood do not so much 
impress us, but those of the second, the helpless infancy 
of old age, compel the thought that with better adapted 
instruments the spirit could accomplish greater things — 
how much greater, if freed from the incumbrance of these, 
or fitted with organs capable of all its glorious strength 
" it hath not entered into the heart of man to conceive." 



METAPHYSICS. 181 



v. 



The brain the focal centre of the impressions from without, and the salient point 
of all volition, therefore, the immediate organ of the mind — The affections do 
not belong to the viscera, argued from the structure of the inferior animals, 
young children, idiots, from diseases, and from the singleness of function of 
every organ — Organic sympathies. f 

We have seen that the different tissues and organs in the 
human system bear each a more or less remote relation to 
the mental actions. The Brain seems to be the nearest, the 
first link, in the series of instruments by which the soul 
maintains its present intercourse with surrounding things. 

It is the seat of consciousness. All impressions made 
upon the external senses, and all affections of the body 
generally, are perceived or recognized there as in the centre 
of animal life. The nerves, which are the organs of sensa- 
tion, meet and deliver their impressions there. Whatever 
interrupts this nervous communication, and so disconnects 
any part of the body from the brain, renders consciousness 
of its conditions, changes, and affections, impossible. If 
the optic nerve be cut, tied, or compressed, vision is inter- 
rupted, whatever be the condition of the eyeball ; and no 
violence inflicted upon a limb, if its nerves are in like man- 
ner interrupted, will reach the seat of consciousness and be 
felt by the mind. 

Moreover, if the brain itself be compressed by fluids, 
tumors, or depression of the surrounding bone, or if its own 
blood vessels be turgid to the extent of suspending its func- 
tions, though all the rest of the body is in perfect health, 
the torture of the rack cannot awaken the subject to ans 



182 METAPHYSICS. 

sense of pain, any perception of surrounding things, or, con- 
sciousness of his own existence. 

Again : the brain is the immediate instrument and seat 
of the mind ; for, all its volitions proceed thence. As in 
the former instance, whenever a sensitive nerve is inter- 
rupted, sensation and perception by it fail, so, whenever a 
motor nerve is divided, compressed, or otherwise reudered 
incapable of its office, no exertion of the will can produce 
any motion in the muscle or member which that nerve sup- 
plies. Organic life may continue in the part for any length 
of time, but its obedience to the will is wholly prevented ; 
the limb or muscle is thenceforth beyond the control of the 
mind. 

The Brain being thus the treasure-house of sensation, the 
place where all communications from the external world are 
gathered to a point, and where all the changes in the body 
are recognized ; being the point, also, whence the mandates 
of the mind issue — the council-chamber and throne-room of 
the soul's sovereignty — it has all the conditions, and answers 
every requirement, which should constitute it the immediate 
organ and instrument of the mental faculties. 

In popular apprehension and language the intellectual 
powers are ascribed in a general way to the head ; and to 
this reference of them everybody's experience testifies with 
unequivocal clearness. All the facts by which the locality 
of such functions may be ascertained, connect themselves 
with the brain, at least as clearly as vision is felt to be by 
the eye, or, hearing by the ear. The ordinary and moderate 
activity of neither is felt at all, so as to be referred to them 
distinctly ; but unusual intensity of effort, and that feeling 
of fatigue which follows long-continued action of the reflect- 
ing faculties, locate themselves as distinctly in the brain, as 
intense action and fatigue of these senses are felt in their 



METAPHYSICS. 183 

respective organs. Moreover, the intellectual actions indi- 
cate their corporeal locality with the greater certainty, 
because it is not confused by any of their secondary or 
reflected effects upon other parts of the body. The percep- 
tive and reflective powers employ chiefly the voluntary appa- 
ratus of the body (the muscles and members of the face 
and limbs), in their service ; and the sympathetic motions 
and sensations which thought excites are seen and felt 
almost exclusively in those outward organs, and in their 
attitudes and gestures ; but they are so remotely connected 
with the animal life, and so distinctly subordinate to the mind, 
that their amputation or other incapacities of action are 
known to be no hindrance to its functions. Their affections 
are so plainly symptomatic only that they are in no danger 
of being mistaken for signs of the immediate presence of the 
primary impulse. The finger that assists in delineating a 
thought is not suspected of being the thinking instrument ; 
and the eyebrow, corrugated in the effort to recover a 
lost idea, is too plainly a symbol of the natural language, 
'to be credited with any nearer office in the service of the 
memory. 

But it has happened, because emotion manifests itself 
often with great force in the viscera of the chest and abdo- 
men, that popular opinion has located the affections there ; 
and following this notion and addressing itself to it, Poetry 
has almost consecrated the prejudice, and even Science, 
with some formality of effort but without any success, has 
occasionally attempted its justification. 

I feel strongly tempted to undertake the explanation of 
this much honored conceit ; for its grounds and reasons are 
full of interest and beauty ; but, I must content myself now 
with disproving it. 

The following facts and considerations are thrown toge- 



184 METAPHYSICS. 

ther very hastily, and, perhaps, with too little order for 
effect, but they are given as much to indicate the proper 
method of the inquiry as to attain its end. 

Many animals endowed with certain feelings are quite 
destitute of the organs to which this hypothesis ascribes 
them. Insects subject to anger and hate have neither liver 
nor bile ; or, if microscopic facts of the negative kind are 
doubtful, it is at least certain that lambs of the gentlest 
temper have as large livers as the most pugnacious dogs of 
the same size. Generally — the dog, the sheep, the lion, the 
horse, the tiger, and the wild boar, have viscera and nervous 
arrangements in the great cavities of the trunk, not at all 
different in those respects which, according to the theory in 
dispute, must account for their difference of propensities 
and passions. They are marked, in fact, by no peculiari- 
ties of visceral structure but such as the digestion of their 
dissimilar aliments requires. 

Again : the organs in the chest and abdomen of young 
children arc in high activity and perfection, and are even 
more excitable and vigorous than in adults ; yet several of 
the feelings attributed to them (such as compassion, friend- 
ship, conscience, and religious hope and faith) either appear 
not at all, or in a very inferior degree. The heart, for 
instance, is fully developed and very active long before all 
the loves ascribed to it are manifested at all, and the mani- 
festation in no period of life is in any constant proportion 
to the development of this organ. 

Again : complete idiots have all these organs, sometimes 
in great perfection of power and in full health, but none of 
the feelings that by this doctrine should belong to them. 

Again : the feelings are not deranged invariably in pro- 
portion as the viscera are diseased. It is not denied that 
their morbid states are occasionally the cause of moral dis- 



METAPHYSICS. 185 

ease (and alienation of the intellect, also, though only the 
emotions are said to be seated in the diseased parts), but 
such disease, it would be easy to demonstrate, results 
directly from morbid actions propagated to the brain from 
their primitive seat in the viscera, and thus result in mental 
and moral disturbance. 

Furthermore: it is a principle in the animal economy 
that every organic part performs only one function — a prin- 
ciple of the highest importance in the study of the vital 
laws, and capable of the clearest elucidation (which is 
deferred till we consider the subject of mental analysis and 
the plurality of the mental organs). 

But this doctrine would make the heart of the tiger, which 
circulates his blood, the seat of his cruelty, and, to add con- 
tradiction to confusion, it makes that of the lamb the organ 
of meekness! In the human subject it is burdened with 
such quantities and contrarieties of work as are quite suffi- 
cient to derange and break it in the happiest individual — it 
must do up our loving of all sorts, and every variety of 
hating; our hoping and doubting and believing; fighting 
and fearing; rejoicing and sorrowing; and, indeed, everything 
else that takes the form of feeling in our complex expe- 
riences! Tone and temperament of body have indeed much 
to do with our emotional nature and moral character, but it 
is only as giving tone and temperament that the liver, lungs, 
heart, and spleen have any modifying influence upon our feel- 
ings. It is impossible that they should be the immediate 
instruments of the affective powers and passional impulses. 

It is true that the emotions so ascribed to these parts of 
the body are felt in them, and much of the force of passion 
is often expended upon them. Joy and sorrow suspend the 
appetite ; grief affects the lungs, and sighs and groans indi- 
cate the seat of the corporeal suffering, as well as give it its 



186 METAPHYSICS. 

natural expression. In fear the heart flutters as if it 
struggled for flight; and in honest indignation swells as 
high ; and beats as boldly, as might serve for the elocution 
of the sentiment; but all these, and many other conspicuous 
affections of these viscera, no more entitle them to claim the 
office of producing the feelings, than the eyes that stream 
with pity, the lips that quiver in anger, or the knees that 
smite each other in affright, may justly claim to be the seats 
of compassion, rage, and fear. Those affections of the 
heart, stomach, eyes, lungs, lips, and limbs are alike effects of 
actions begun in a distant part, the brain, and are propagated 
to them by virtue of those sympathies which link all the parts 
of the frame into unity of suffering and harmony of action, 
so that " when one member suffers all the others suffer with 
it, and when one member is honored all the others rejoice 
with it." Whatever be the necessity and use of these sympa- 
thies, which thus involve the whole fabric (as its parts are 
severally more or less nearly related to the centre of life) in 
a common weal or woe, and establish the intimate reciproci- 
ties of body and mind, the integral life is ordained in such 
arrangements of the corporeal structure as abundantly 
secure them. The viscera of the great cavities are by the 
great sympathetic nerve connected with the spinal cord, the 
brain, and with each other; and, by the pneumo-gastric, 
a lesser sympathetic nerve, with the organs of voice, the 
eyes, nose, tongue, and with other parts of the brain. Now 
because of this universality of connection a sensation in any 
particular organ is not sufficient proof that the change felt 
originated there where it is first perceived; nor, on the 
other hand, need the free play of these sympathies confuse 
the inferences of science drawn from such facts. Legitimate 
reasoning, nevertheless, finds a safe clue through the laby- 
rinth and rests upon certainties in the issue. 



METAPHYSICS. 187 

We conclude from all these considerations that the popular 
and poetic language which seems to except moral emotions 
from among the functions of the brain, is oaly figurative, 
and not at all philosophical, though not the less beautiful 
and effective for the service in which it is employed. 

The discussion of the doctrine which credits the produc- 
tion, instrumentally, of the propensities and sentiments of 
our nature to the breathing, circulating, and digestive 
organs, might have been spared if only its own proper con- 
clusions were aimed at, but it is given now for other services 
which it is expected to render some other day. It helps, 
too, to impress the proposition that the mind is manifested 
by the material organization, and that the brain is its imme- 
diate instrument, by impressing the method of philosophizing 
by which that proposition is sustained. The mental mani- 
festations must be brought clearly within the region and 
rule of the material laws so far as they are really incarnated 
and phenomenally dependent, or we shall be thinking meta- 
physics over our studies in physics, and by a compensating 
blunder, perhaps, mixing up a muddy materialism with the 
the highest speculations in the domain of spirit. 



188 METAPHYSICS 



VI. 

Mental analysis— Defects of the accepted theories in aim and method— Spiritual 
science beyond the jurisdiction of that experience which is the test of physical 
truth — The mind's relations, affections, and modes of action, various; its organ- 
ization inferred — Naturalists recognize notions of their subjects, general, common 
and special; metaphysicians stop short of the special and elementary — Scientific 
analysis resolves all compounds ^objects and ideas) into their elements— -Plurality 
of the mental faculties and of their cerebral organs indicated by analogies in the 
mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms, especially in the nervous system ; 
fatigue, of a single power; dreams and partial insanity — Connection between 
forms and uses, absolute and necessary. 

It is possible to conceive of the mind as a simple and 
indivisible substance or essence, capable of passing into 
different states, and so, in its entirety, manifesting all its 
varied modes of action and affection. Some systematic 
theorists formally affirm this doctrine of it, and the most 
of those who do not trouble themselves with the point 
involved, in effect treat it so. Denying to spirit all the 
properties, laws, and conditions of matter, and all corres- 
pondence to it, they anxiously exclude all conceptions of 
it, either in substance or in action, which embrace the 
idea of divisions, parts, and complexity of constititution 
and function. 

It is also possible to regard it as an aggregate, or 
congeries, of faculties and capacities, distinct and coexistent; 
somewhat in the light of an organic structure, or, analogous 
to the human body, which, though it is an unit by organization, 
consists of a great number of members, so unlike that no 
one is capable of the office of any other, and, though 
admittiug an almost infinite variety of combinations in 
action, the whole is perhaps never engaged in any one 
particular act. 



METAPHYSICS. 189 

Mere observation, without the least reflection or philoso- 
phy, teaches and impresses a distinction among the processes 
of nature — crystallization, solution, elasticity, gravitation 
of unsupported bodies, evaporation, and such like phenomena, 
get noticed, individualized and named. So, the neces- 
sities of thought and communication oblige every one to 
distinguish those general kinds of mental action which 
are designated by the names of perception, judgment, 
memory, benevolence, devotion, reasoning, instinct, etc. 
The philosophies in vogue occupy themselves with these 
phases of mental manifestation, and after the example of 
the sciences which are entitled to the term, they also speak 
of analysis, although their method has no just pretensions to 
it, being, in fact, only an assorting or classifying of ultimate 
effects and appearances, in total disregard of the elementary 
powers upon which they depend. If here and there a 
fundamental faculty gets recognition, in some of these 
systems, it is an accident and not the result of any such 
analytical method as promises to bring the intrinsic consti- 
tution and nature of the mind into notice. However and 
to whatever purpose they employ investigation, they never 
press analysis so as to trace differences of office up to any 
real distinction of elementary faculty in the mental structure. 
If one were to demand from a college of metaphysicians a 
science of mind really equivalent to the chemistry of matter, 
he would be stunned with a general disclaimer of all such 
inquiries — he might as well ask them for the anatomy of 
the " spiritual body" itself. Indeed, there is no chapter in 
the modern psychologies half so long, half so full of preten- 
sion, or so glorified with the eloquence of words, or, so 
glutted with twattle and cant, as that one which disavows 
all ontological investigations, and all possibility of knowledge 
in the intimate constitution of the mind. Authors and 



190 METAPHYSICS. 

declaimers are never so much on parade as when they are 
arguing the philosophy of this pet negation of theirs, and 
illustrating the wonderful wisdom of its ignorance ! Physical 
science makes such a figure among its terra firma data that 
the truths which can show no other evidence than their 
moral and logical necessity, are not allowed to assert an 
equal certainty, or pretend to scientific demonstration. 
"Experiment and induction thence" is the battle cry of 
material philosophy in its strife with the mysteries of nature, 
and under it she has achieved her stupendous victories; but 
spiritual science cannot pile up her trophies on the field of 
achievement like steam and electricity, and the finer truths 
of the more ethereal philosophy are drowned amid the din 
and clatter of physical demonstration. "Experience " (said 
some Johnsonian dogmatist, half a century ago), "which is 
constantly contradicting human theories, is the only test of 
truth." But it is obvious that experience can only contra- 
dict theories of such things as it has cognizance of, and that 
all the stumbling which it can detect is done on its own 
stilts. It is, in fact, busy at nothing but denying things 
that it knows nothing about, and contradicting the false- 
hoods which it taught before — repenting its own crimes and 
cobbling its own blunders, and committing and making new 
ones, to be corrected in like manner as it gets wiser. This 
maxim is nevertheless employed to prohibit all inquiry 
beyond the range of sense and observation, and it has had 
the luck, absurdly enough, to secure the homage at once of 
philosophical bigotry and skepticism. Locke and Hume 
agree upon it as a starting point, and the coarsest material- 
ists and devoutest religionists here occupy common theoretical 
ground. 

Misdirected by the notion that experiment must guide 
and limit analysis in spiritual as in physical science, inquiry 



METAPHYSICS. 191 

has made no systematic effort to unfold the intrinsic consti- 
tution of the mind. But, knowledge, to be useful, must be 
special and particular where it touches on fact and principle; 
and the office and use of analysis is to resolve compounds 
into their elements, and to reduce general into specific ideas. 
In mental science it is the function of analysis to trace 
manifestations till they stand appropriated in the primitive 
and fundamental faculties which, produce them. Ultimate 
actions and effects are the poiuts of departure, not the aims, 
in this inquiry; yet in the various systems extant, perhaps 
not half a dozen truly elementary powers are indicated, and 
even these are not admitted in any broad apprehension of 
the great principle which governs in the evolution of natural 
truth. Speculation has been mainly occupied with systema- 
tizing operations where they ultimate in the facts of observa- 
tion and experience, and with the most general views of 
these. 

If the intrinsic constitution of the soul were wholly inscru- 
table, or if it were ascertained to be without parts or com- 
position — a simple essence and a single power in its inmost 
nature — it is yet so obviously the subject of such greatly 
varied states, actions and relations, that a theory of simplism 
applied to its phenomena and constitution answers none of 
the ends for which science is pursued. It is, indeed, difficult 
to conceive how auy truth, even the most absract, can be so 
useless for all practical purposes as this notion is. Still, 
whether simple in essence or not, it is not with its substance 
that we are concerned, but w r ith its manner of existence, and 
with its modes of activity, which certainly are exceedingly 
complex. 

The soul is in relation with all that variety of natural 
beings which immediately surrounds it; it is susceptible of 
their manifold properties; it is variously modified by them; 



192 METAPHYSICS. 

and, it is capable of multiform action upon them. In this 
region of its relations there are such properties and condi- 
tions of things as, color, form, order, number, size, weight, 
and place. The mind has also conceptions, of time, of 
causation, and, of analogy, melody, beauty, and harmony, 
among the objects of sense and its own ideas. All these 
are varied modes of mental action, and signify and proclaim 
a correspondent variety of powers in its nature, and argue 
its organization. 

Moreover, it is adjusted to duty and enjoyment by 
numerous forms of emotion which link it by its richly 
varied loves to the society of its kind, and fit it for all the 
reciprocities of service and regards which constitute its 
social life. And above all these — and they are many and 
noble, ranging through the whole scale of affections from 
simple amenity of manners up to universal benevolence — 
above all these, in office and aim, tower the religious affec- 
tions, apprehending and responding to the attributes of the 
Divine, and completing and crowning that wondrous corres- 
pondence and adjustment of faculty to object which consti- 
tutes the human nature a reproduction of all that is below 
it, and a reflection of all that is above it, in the universe. 

Naturalists have not been satisfied with general conceptions 
in their respective departments. They have carried their 
science deeper into the secrets of nature than the general 
notion that all inanimate bodies have extension, configura- 
tion, mobility, and such like; nay, they rest not even in 
those qualities which are common to kinds of objects, as of 
metals — their ductility, density and lustre. Particular 
metals, such as copper, iron, gold, must be specified — 
particular earths, as chalk, clay, &c. Indeed, analysis has 
scarcely begun its work at the point of these very obvious 
distinctions; it decomposes every compound, discovers the 



METAPHYSICS. 193 

gases, and the bases of the earths, alkalies and metals, until 
the simple elements of all substances are separated, and 
their properties, affinities and spheres of action are all 
known. Science pulls all fabrics into pieces to learn the 
mystery of their construction, and to acquire the power of 
producing others; she resolves all substances into the ele- 
mental chaos again to note the laws and trace the process 
of their organization, and she wrenches from the very heart 
of nature the secrets which invest her with its dominion. 
Ideas and notions, general and abstract, are the outline 
intuitions and spontaneous products of our faculties, and are 
given as receptacles of the particular truths which they 
logically include, and all the learning of life is nothing else 
than producing them into their ultimated specialties. I 
have the general conception of causation as capacity for 
comprehending all forms and modes of efficiency: I have the 
sentiment of reverence as a general impulse to the homages 
severally due to all the species of exalted worth ; and, bene- 
volence to be branched out to its diverse objects in due 
quality and measure. Distinctness, individuality, specialty, 
is the drift and destination of all intellectual development: 
it lives and grows only by the digestion of its aliment, and 
its more than chemical perfectness of decomposition and assi- 
milation. 

Speculation in this matter tends to practice, and opinions 
affect interests. It is not a matter of indifference whether 
morality be regarded as a product of reflection, and so within 
the reach and power of preceptive instruction; or, be attri- 
buted to faculties as different from those of the understand- 
ing as the ear is from the eye, and requiring a correspondent 
difference of culture. An education proceeding upon the 
ground that morals must be proved will result very differ- 
ently from that system which teaches that they must be felt. 
9 



194 METAPHYSICS. 

But, the judgment of a notion is pronounced when it is 
found untrue, for mischief only can result from falsehood; 
and, the health and life of the soul depend as closely upon 
the truth of its treatment, as the body's upon the relations 
which it maintains to the physical forces that surround it. 

I will not further insist upon the necessity of special, inti- 
mate, distinctive and accurate knowledge of the objects of 
natural science, and its still more eminent importance in the 
science of mind, by all the difference of its dignity and value 
above every other. 

I do not admit that inquiry into the intimate nature of the 
soul is impracticable, or unprofitable, or unnecessary, or 
forbidden ; but, as the truth under consideration lies displayed 
in both provinces of our being, we will pursue it now in the 
region of physical inquiry. 

The mind, whether a simple force, like the stream that 
drives a mill, or complex, as the hand that moves within its 
glove, is attached to the bodily organization, and within 
the sphere of physics closely conforms to the laws of its 
material machinery. To every variety of external objects 
the mechanism has an adapted variety of structure, and the 
multiform offices of the mental instruments intimate a cor- 
responding difference of faculties in the agent. A part of 
any machine which represents no thought, and forwards no 
purpose, and answers to no necessity of the design in which 
it is employed, is absurd and impertinent. 

We have taken the ground that the brain is the immedi- 
ate instrument of the mind, and, of course, hold that in 
this service it is subject to all the laws of organism. Ana- 
tomical analysis, like chemical, ascertains the fact that 
every difference of quality and function takes difference of 
form and organization; and we have in every realm of 
nature the general law that for the production of dissimilar 



METAPHYSICS. 195 

effects the material conditions of bodies are always varied. In 
the inanimate world every salt and metal has a peculiar 
crystallization as decided as its difference of qualities; the 
chemist knows them by their figure alone. In vegetable 
life the difference of structure is just as great as the differ- 
ence of character among plants: the instructed sense of the 
botanist distinguishes kinds, species and varieties by visible 
and tangible differences of organization ; and, in the indivi- 
dual plant, the wood, the leaves, the fruit, are as distinguish- 
able in form and arrangement as in office. But it is in the 
human constitution especially, w T here all the endowments of 
the inferior creation are reproduced and still nobler ones 
are added, that this law gets overwhelming demonstration. 
Passing over the more open and obvious illustrations offered 
by the heart, lungs, liver, etc., of the doctrine that differ- 
ences of function, vital as well as mechanical, require variety 
of apparatus, let us trace the evidences of the law more 
minutely in the divisions of function in a single organ of 
sense. The tongue is the organ of taste. We speak of the 
sense of taste as a single one — as one of five; but savors are 
diverse; there are, among others, easily distinguished, sour, 
sweet, and bitter, and each of these is appropriated to a spe- 
cial part of the tongue, and is felt in no other place. Sour 
at the tip, sweet along the edges and under them, and 
bitter at the root. If the tongue is thrust beyond the lips, 
the acidity of cream of tartar will be produced the instant 
that it touches the extremity of the organ; but aloes, though 
a most malignant bitter, is not appreciated or recognized in 
that position and place at all. So, if the acid is carefully 
laid on the root of the tongue, it will be swallowed without 
being perceived; but bitter clings there for a long time after 
the impression is made. Xow, if the difference of sour and 
bitter and sweet, demands a change of structure and quali- 



196 METAPHYSICS. 

ties, we have tile infinite complexity of the animal organiza- 
tion illustrated, and the doctrine that no one texture per- 
forms more than one office, fully supported. 

The varied susceptibility of the body to the effects of 
drugs, renders it probable that every remedial agent has a 
specific destination. Indeed, if it were not so, varying the 
dose and circumstances of administration would produce all 
the variety of effects which in practice is obtained only by a 
multiplication of remedies. 

The nervous system, by virtue of its higher organization 
and nearer analogies to our subject, is the best qualified, and 
is, in fact, the clearest witness to the truth of our proposi- 
tion. The nerves which connect the brain and spinal cord 
with the general muscular system, and convey the volitions 
from the brain to the members, and the sensations from the 
surface to the brain, are demonstrated now to be double in 
structure as they are known to be in function. They all rise 
by double roots, one the sensitive, the other the motor, nerve. 
The complexity of the nervous, distribution generally is to 
the same point, and unequivocal. The tongue has taste, 
common voluntary motion, common sensation, and motion 
associated with respiration in oral language; to give it 
these endowments it has as many kinds of nerves coming to 
it from totally different sources. It has a gustatory, a 
respiratory, a motor, and a sensitive, nerve. The eye in 
like manner has its nerve of vision, common sensation, 
motion, and expression — a complexity of apparatus answer- 
ing to the diversity of offices in perfect numerical parallelism. 
It is not so in the circulation of the blood; there, the fluid 
is uniform in its constitution, and all parts of the body are 
supplied from the main trunks as they pass, by the nearest 
and most convenient routes; just as the principal water- 
pipes in our cities are tapped to supply the want in the 



METAPHYSICS. 19T 

immediate vicinity. But nerves, whose general office it is 
to endow the body with all its modes of vitality, come from 
all directions and distances to supply a single organ with its 
many kinds of power and capacity. 

The impression might be greatly deepened by multiplying 
the proofs of the doctrine which these few facts illustrate. 
If only a finger be so far mentally analyzed as to distinguish 
its muscles, arteries, nerves, and skin, and the modifications 
of structure be dwelt upon long enough to raise its own phi- 
losophy, the conclusion will be irresistible that the mechanism 
of Nature is just as complex as her operations are various; 
and, the extreme simplicity of apparatus, so often ascribed 
to her, will appear rather oratorical than oracular. The 
truth is that every fibre in the animal body, every atom in 
the creation, having a special office, has a distinct form; 
that quality and structure are in necessary connection; and, 
that all the forms of things depend upon their uses. The 
elements of material beings are probably distinct in proper- 
ties and embodiment as they stand in the Divine conception 
— certainly they are, as they are related to all other 
agencies; and the continual flux of forms which marks the 
ceaseless dissolutions and new creations of existence, results 
from the play of laws which rest in this intrinsic difference 
of the permanent elements. 

At the risk of tediousness I must, for the sake of disci- 
pline where conviction already exists, and for adaptation to 
styles of mind not met by the previous method of treatment, 
offer some other arguments for the diversity of the mental 
faculties and, under our rule, the corresponding plurality 
of the cerebral organs. They are such as these, viz. : The 
inequality of faculties in the same mind — difference of 
ability for different things being both original and insur- 
mountable. Walter Scott could not draw with a pencil the 



198 METAPHYSICS. 

landscapes which he painted in words— Michal Angeld was 
absolutely incapable of composing the pictures of Raphael. 
A great master fails in drawing while he excels in coloring; 
another shall have form and attitude exquisitely, and never 
attain to eminence in color. Washington could not have 
written Byron's poetry, nor could Newton have created 
Macbeth. The inference is that the difference of faculty is 
not merely change of state of the whole mind, so that 
strengthening it generally will necessarily strengthen it in 
every particular power or mode of manifestation; and the 
facts in the case of every man — in his intellect and in his 
morals — are conclusive. 

Fatigue of a single faculty while the others remain vigor- 
ous and capable, is a clear proof of distinct organic apparatus; 
and dreaming, somnambulism, and partial insanity, are easily 
understood upon the hypothesis of a plurality of nervous 
instruments, and are utterly inexplicable on any other. 
Madness, though complete as to some of the powers, is 
seldom universal; and the absurdity of dreams is often seen 
to be in the inactivity of a single faculty, as of conscience, 
time, benevolence. Frightful crimes are committed in sleep, 
without the slightest thought of the wrong; and dates and 
localities not only fall into confusion, but often fall clean out 
of consideration and consciousness. It is remarkable, too, 
that the feeling or faculty most active during the preceding 
day is by exhaustion the wanting one in the phantasms of 
the night; while all the other parts and processes are 
conducted coherently and consistently by the faculties which 
are awake in this state of partial sleep. In our daylight 
wakefulness and general activity, the faculties are never all 
at work at once, nor capable of it. 

Our conclusion, clear enough before, is reinforced by these 
considerations, and we write it down for settled that — 



METAPHYSICS. 199 

The faculties of the intellect, and the sentiments, affec- 
ticns, passions, and instincts of the moral nature, are very 
numerous and unlike; and that — 

They are each manifested by a special part of the cerebral 
apparatus. 



TIL 

Analysis and Generalisation in physics — Confounded in Metaphysical systems — Their 
method varied according to differences of aim — General and descriptive anatomies 
of the body, their difference of drift — Metaphysical systems a general physiology 
of mind — The descriptive and special required — Criticism of the faculties usually 
admitted — Desire and Will — Categories of Aristotle, of Kant — Disharmony of 
metaphysical theories. 

A science is defined to be a collection of the general 
principles, or leading truths relatiug to any subject, arranged 
in systematic order. 

. In the discovery of scientific truth analysis, or the separa- 
tion of compounds into then- simple elements, is pursued 
until a natural history of the facts is secured; next, the facts 
collected are classified; thirdly, their respective and relative 
weight and significance are investigated and estimated; 
and, lastly, the laws of the phenomena in question, thus 
ascertained, are pursued through successive generalizations, 
from the least comprehensive regularly upwards, till the high 
est and most general principle is reached. This is the Bacon- 
ian or Inductive method. Its adaptation to the whole range 
of physical truth is unquestionable. It is the life and soul 
of the experimental philosophy, and its triumphs in the sphere 
of materialism are the proofs of its validity. Its fitness and 
value as a method of metaphysical research are logically 
very questionable, and the results of its employment hitherto 



200 METAPHYSICS. 

are, strictly speaking, equivocal. The facts and laws of 
mind which are clearly matters of observation, fall fairly 
within its jurisdiction; but there are other facts of mind 
which are intuitive and witnessed only by our consciousness, 
and so, lie quite out of its range. Bacon, himself, applied 
it sparingly, and with great hesitation, to psychology. A 
very few pages of his voluminous works contain all that he 
wrote of a strictly metaphysical character. 

Analysis, in physics, is the separation of a compound body 
into its constituent elements; in logic, it is the tracing of 
things to their sources, or, the resolving of knowledge into 
its original principles. 

Generalization is the classified colligation of facts, under 
such conceptions of their classes, as at once express the 
general truth, and contain the particular truths, embraced 
in them. The law of a class of facts must describe all the 
individual facts which it covers; it does not merge or sink 
them in a verbal menstruum, indistinguishably dissolved, and 
requiring a new and delicate analysis to render them up to 
observation again. It is not reduction by evaporation, but 
natural arrangement by crystallization, that best illustrates 
the process. 

Analysis to ultimates, and legitimate generalization, may 
be called the instruments of scientific research and philoso- 
phic induction. The chemist loosens the simple bodies com- 
bined and hidden in his compounds, examines them separately, 
ascertains their several qualities, and their relations to each 
other; in effect, he dissects his subjects, and learns the 
functions of their elementary parts. The botanist and 
zoologist follow the same method. The analyst of inorganic, 
and the anatomist of organic, matter have similar aims — the 
discovery of the primitive elements in all compounds, and 
the determination of their qualities and agencies. 



METAPHYSICS. 201 

Thus, a science, or, in other words, a complete knowledge 
of a subject, according to the inductive method, is achieved. 
But it needs to be observed that each science, or art, 
directs its inquiries, collects its data, and forms its 
classification, following only those things and properties 
which fail within its special cognizance, or which it 
must take into account to accomplish its special ends. 
There may, therefore, be several sciences of the same com- 
mon subject. Thus, man is properly the subject of anatomy, 
physiology, psychology, sociology, &c. Each of these are 
concerned with the human constitution, and often with the 
same parts of it, but with such difference of objects and 
ultimate drift, that the facts and principles of neither of 
them separately, nor of all together, will certainly serve for 
a system of mental philosophy. It is, for this reason, not 
enough that a particular science of a given subject be com- 
pact, coherent and complete in and for itself. The general 
subject may be capable of something more and something 
else for other or more comprehensive uses. 

Even the science of anatomy, with its inseparable physi- 
ology, is divided by the medical profession into two distinct 
and very dissimilar systems. Their general anatomy follows 
the specific tissues of the body wherever they are found; 
the cellular membrane, for instance, through the entire frame, 
in the bones, coats of the blood vessels, sheathings of the 
muscles, meninges of the brain, coats of the viscera, linings 
of the cavities, texture of the viscera, &c, without any con 
sideration or regard for the determinate organs, into which 
it enters; and so of all the other primitive textures in turn, 
of which the various organs of the bodies are composed. 
The object of this science is to find mucous membrane, mus- 
cular fibre, nervous matter, osseous fibre, lime, blood glo- 
bules, wherever they are distributed, and to settle and 



202 METAPHYSICS. 

determine their- intrinsic qualities, without concern for the 
form, place, office, or relations and functions of the several 
organs. It has nothing to do with the stomach as an organ 
of digestion, with the eye as an instrument of vision, or with 
the brain as an apparatus of innervation. 

But special or descriptive anatomy, while it necessarily 
embraces, in its own way and for its own ends, all that 
general anatomy teaches of the primitive tissues, concerns 
itself also with the integral structure and special function, 
and with every quality, condition, and relation of, each and 
all the organs of the body. It charges itself, for instance, 
with the several coats of the stomach, its arteries, nerves, 
veins, absorbents, with the gastric fluid, the phenomena of 
digestion, the sympathies which link it with associated 
organs, and all that enters into its constitution and functions 
as a whole. 

In other words, general anatomy treats its subjects as .a 
mere mineralogist or chemist would examine and report the 
several metals and other materials of a watch; while special 
anatomy considers and renders its subjects as a scientific 
machinist would treat the workmanship, the wheels, the 
springs, construction and motion, of the time-piece, without at 
all overlooking the various materials of which it is composed. 

Xow my apprehension of the sytems of mental philosophy 
which the world has in time past held legitimate is, that 
they are strikingly analogous to that general anatomy of 
the human fabric which we have here described; and, that 
the defects and faults of their teachings result inevitably 
from the neglect of those specialties of the mental constitu- 
tion and functions which correspond to and demand a des- 
criptive anatomy and physiology. 

The schools have, besides, analyzed, in their way, thought 
and feeling, rather than mind — actions and effects, rather than 



METAPHYSICS. 203 

• 

instruments and powers. They have attempted a general 
physiology, unconditioned upon anatomy ; they have treated 
functions without reference to the special faculties which 
they indicate, and suppose, and depend upon; just as the 
functions of the animal frame are regarded by the unlearned 
without any consideration of, or reference to, the organs 
which manifest them. 

We do not propose a history nor a general criticism of 
mental philosophy as it exists, but certain classes of these 
speculations may be considered to a certain extent in 
advancement of our own object. One class of metaphysicians 
conceives of the fundamental phenomena of mind, as if they 
were identical with its primitive or elementary faculties, and 
divide them, with more or less agreement among themselves, 
into consciousness, sensation, perception, attention, sympa- 
thy, antipathy, pleasure, pain, desire and will. 

jSTow, this analysis, with any possible rectification in par- 
ticulars, is only, and at best, a sort of general physiology of 
.mind; and it has no conformity of principle and method to 
such a distinction of mental powers and functions as will 
entitle it to the analogical name of a mental chemistry. 
What just claim has it then, to the character of a complete 
analysis of its subject, or to a useful generalization of its 
laws ? 

Let us see: — 

Consciousness is the immediate knowledge we have of the 
operations of our own minds. It is identical with mind — a 
necessary concomitant of all its operations. It is a general 
term. It is an effect of the activity of any one, and of all 
the fundamental faculties. And the physiologist might as 
well enumerate vitality, the inseparable accompaniment and 
issue of all the organic actions of the body, as one of its 



204 METAPHYSICS. 

simple functions, The chemist might as justly speak of 
molecular motion as one of the elements of matter. 

Sensation is also a general term. It means an immanent 
act of the mind — an act that has no object distinct from the 
mind itself, or, an affection of the mind regarded as severed 
from its cause, the simple reception or the undergoing of an 
impression. It belongs to every power of the mind which 
is the subject of actions from without — it belongs to each 
of the five senses; it is induced by heat and cold, and 
results from every contact with foreign bodies; it accompa- 
nies muscular motion; it occurs often in the viscera; it is an 
incident of all the passions and emotions, and of many of 
the ideas of the mind; and in all these instances is corres- 
pondingly modified. It may be compared, for our purpose, 
with physiological sensibility, and with the chemical pheno- 
menon, Conduction. 

Perception is also a general term. It is distinctively used 
to signify that act of the mind by which it refers its sensa- 
tions to their external corporeal cause. By it we have the 
conviction of the objective things which cause our sensations. 
It is exerted by as many of our fundamental faculties as 
are perceptive in their nature and office, and these faculties 
are as numerous and unlike as the qualities of external things 
which are their objects. Those things have size, color, form, 
position, order, number and other properties; each of which 
requires a special mental power for its recognition. Percep- 
tion is, therefore, a comprehensive, and not a specific, desig- 
nation for these offices of the intellect. The word is as 
general as reflection in optics, or in acoustics, or as vibra- ' 
tion in music, or reaction in medicine. 

Attention denotes the active state of every intellectual 
faculty; sometimes it means the combined activity of 



M E I A PHYSICS. 205 

several; but it is no more a fundamental power than is 
organic tonicity in physiology, or cohesion iu chemistry. 

Memory is the capacity of the mind for returning to the 
same state, in the absence of the object, which its presence 
induced in the previous act of perception. Essentially, it is 
the perceptions reproduced. It applies, also, to the states 
of the passions and affections after they have passed away. 
The heart's experiences, all of them, are objects of memory; 
differing, however, from the recollection of external things 
in this, that the feelings themselves are not revived, but 
remembered rather as events in our mental history. It is 
hence of so many kinds, and so unlike in its numerous modi- 
fications, that the idea of it according to the metaphysicians 
is not a whit more analytic than excitability in physiology, 
or reviviscence in chemistry. 

Judgment. — The received technical definition of this word 
is, perhaps, capable of holding all its proper meanings; but 
it needs rectification, and greatly lacks exactitude. It 
needs just what a definition should have — a clear and expli- 
cit inclusion of all that belongs to the thing defined, and the 
exclusion of all that does not beloug to it. It is not enough 
to say of judgment, that " it is the act or process of the 
mind in comparing its ideas, to find their agreement or dis- 
agreement, and to ascertain truth." This may describe a 
philosophic judgment, a process of systematic or logical reas- 
oning, but it does not apply with any tolerable propriety to 
those instant conclusions which the mind forms of things, and 
their properties and relations, as they are currently presented 
to its perceptions. A musician judges the harmony of 
sounds with as little ratiocination about them as a gour- 
mand exercises in spicing his oysters. In either case an 
ignoramus or an idiot is adequate to a perfect decision of 
the agreement or disagreement, agreeableness or disagree- 



206 



METAPHYSIC; 



ableness of the impressions made upon his senses. All 
the intellectual faculties have judgment, each of its own 
kind, just as the senses have taste, which is a kind of judg- 
ment ; and just as the desires and affections have pleasure in 
the feeling of fulfilled requirement. They also have their 
preferences and make their elections without help from, or 
intervention of, the understanding. A colorist, a costumier, 
a wine-bibber, a horse-jockey, a sagacious dog, perceives, 
feels, decides the relations of things among themselves, and 
to his own relishes, and in effect, affirms and denies concern- 
ing them with as clear and complete judgment as the logi- 
cian, the mathematician, or the moralist exercises upon the 
respective subjects of his own provinces of thought. 

The Instincts are blind to moral distinctions, but they 
know and criticise their own objects. Appetite, in the 
inferior animals, discriminates and finds congruities after com- 
parison of objects ; a young kid which had never yet tasted food 
selected milk from lime-water and a mixture of magnesia 
presented to it. After smelling at each, it decided for the 
right. 

In the judgments which we form of the character and 
feelings of others by the natural signs of gesture and physi- 
ognomy, there is not only no comparison of ideas in the act, 
but really we have no ideas about the matter to compare. 
But judgment, even in the instances to which the received 
definition has some pertinence, is not a single or simple 
power. ~No man has it in equal degree in all the things he 
is concerned with; but every man has it in proportion to 
the power of the faculty to which it belongs. There are, 
therefore, as many kinds of judgment as there are knowing 
faculties in the mind. The perceptive and reflective powers 
all have it, just as they all have memory and imagination, 
also, in their respective spheres or functions. 



METAPHYSICS. 207 

1 

Here again, we ore not supplied with the specific and dis- 
tinctive knowledge which analysis should afford, but, accord- 
ing to our plan of parallelism, it is analogous to assimilation 
in physiology, and to crystallization in chemistry, and is as 
far as they are from being elementary. 

If association signifies that several faculties, in various 
groupings, mutually excite each other, the word is merely 
historical and not analytical in the sense that science demands. 
It describes an event, not a power — a happening, not an 
agent. It might, indeed, designate a law, but it is put for 
an essence. It corresponds very well to sympathy in phy- 
siology, and to elective affinity in chemistry; and these are 
not elements, but actions and accidents. 

The sympathy and antipathy, the pleasure and pain, of 
moral philosophers, are but two pairs of words for the same 
two things. They express relations only, not powers or 
specific constitutional endowments. They stand in mental 
philosophy about where absorption and excretion stand in 
physiology, and are equivalent to the attractive and divellent 
forces of chemistry. They are modes of action of many and 
dissimilar powers. Oxygen is an element, but oxydation or 
effervescence is not. A capillary blood vessel, with its 
vital endowments, is an organ or an instrument ; but absorp- 
tion, excretion, election, assimilation, are only varied and 
accidental manifestations of it. 

Desire and Will are used to comprehend the whole moral 
nature of man. Understanding and Will, Intellect and 
Affections, Intellectual and Active powers, Mind and 
florals, Head and Heart, Thought and Feeling, are usually 
employed to embrace all our speculative or knowing, and 
affective or emotional, faculties. 

The first class we have sufficiently considered, and we 



208 METAPHYSICS. 

dispose of the theory, classification, and nomenclature in use 
for the second, in like manner, for similar reasons. 

Desire, reduced to its essential signification, may be ren- 
dered by the word hunger, thirst, or want. It is the nor- 
mal effect of the activity of any of the feelings, whether of 
the class, instincts, sentiments, moral or religious; indeed it 
can scarcely be denied to the knowing and thinking powers, 
if the same thing, substantially, should always be called by 
the same name, as oxygen carries the same name wherever 
it occurs, whether voraciously active as in the acids, slug- 
gishly at rest as in the rust of iron, or inappreciable to the 
senses, as in the atmosphere. 

If the term be limited to the propensities, it is still gen- 
eric and not specific; for these are very numerous and very 
unlike. The desire for wealth, the desire for fame, and the 
desire for love, is such another analysis of the individualities 
to be covered by it, as the word " wants " at the head of an 
advertising column in a daily newspaper. It includes all 
"the lusts of the flesh, and the desire of the eye, and the 
pride of life." It runs through the moral constitution so uni- 
versally, that it may be compared to the nutritive impulse 
of living organizations: its chemical analogue is electric 
affinity. 

Here again we have a class of actions, instead of an 
analysis of forces or functions, and the specific knowledge 
of each, which we are in search of. 

Will is often but the synonym of desire. It is used to mean 
the particular desire which overwhelms the others, that in any 
particular instance are in conflict with it. But, in different 
individuals, and in the same individual at different times, every 
one of the instincts, sentiments and inclinations must, according 
to this apprehension, become a will ; and thus we would have as 



METAPHYSICS. 209 

many different wills as desires. In this sense it is not properly 
a faculty at all, but an occasional resolution, and has no sort 
of analogy to the limbs, members, or organs of the living body 
by which it is qualified for its various offices and adjusted to 
its diverse objects ; and so, it is no analysis of the moral con- 
stitution; nor has it any better claim to the character of a 
scientific classification of a principle or law of its nature. 
It is a verbal, but not a logical, definition of the thing 
intended; for it does not describe it by kind and difference 
from other things. It is only another word for desire, and 
that has many and dissimilar meanings in philosophy. 

Those philosophers who by the mill intend to include the 
propensities, passions, and sentiments, or, the entire emotional 
side of our nature, no doubt use it so comprehensively, because 
they regard it as the resultant of each particular combination 
of them, and so of all of them in turn. If this be not the same 
notion that we have just now been discussing, it differs from 
it only by being in its employment more confused, and worse 
in its effects. Tery grave consequences have followed this 
looseness of logic, in ethics, as well as in theoretical phi- 
losophy; but it does not fall within our present plan to 
undertake the exposure. 

It is enough to say that will and desire cannot be the 
same thing, for the latter is in its nature a blind unreflect- 
ing force, while the former is alwaye distinguished as an act 
of intelligent determination. Intelligence is held both in 
morals and civil law as an indispensable condition of will. 
It is not a master appetite but a determining motive, inclu- 
ding the notion of reflection and choice. 

Will is considered and treated by some writers as an 
entity, a distinct faculty or force of the mind; but whatever 
the essential element may be, it is phenomenally always a 
decision of the understanding adopted according to motives. 



210 METAPHYSICS. 

It embraces the propensities, sentiments, and sometimes, the 
perceptive powers, as motives, and the understanding as their 
arbiter. It always supposes a plurality of motives, and it 
exhibits an election among them, the reasoning powers being 
the dominant element, or agent, in the process. 

Such a mixture of materials and agencies cannot be a 
simple faculty. Before it can be tabled among the results 
of a scientific analysis it must be decomposed. Upon our 
plan of illustrating the errors and defects of the systems 
under discussion, the will, as a mental faculty, conforms 
somewhat to secretion (the organic choice and modification 
of the elements into determinate forms) of physiology, and 
to precipitation in chemistry. 

It has been our aim in this chapter to expose and to 
account for the errors which we charge upon the systems 
and doctrines, considered. It is very sadly true that the 
teachings of the schools in mental philosophy have attained 
no such certainty or utility of results, as the corresponding 
sciences of physics have afforded the world. At least equal 
talent and zeal have been employed upon it, and the failure 
must be ascribed to erroneous methods and misdirection of 
aim, for, the failure is just as great in those parts of the 
subject which lie fairly open and responsive to inquiry, as in 
those which are supposed to be in their nature inscrutable. 

The fault lies in this, that the cultivators of this branch 
of human knowledge have occupied themselves exclusively 
with general conceptions where they should have sought 
specialties; at the same time making the equally great 
mistake of attending only to processes and effects, w 7 here they 
should have looked for the primitive sources, the elementary 
powers, which display them. They have given, or attempted 
to give, us only a general physiology of mind, without 
so much as admitting specific functions, which must exist, if 



METAPHYSICS. 211 

the mind be a congeries or collection of varied capabilities 
or activities. This method of philosophizing is necessarily 
as erroneous and defective as if in medicine, only sensibility, 
contractility, and secretion in the abstract, were regarded, 
to the exclusion of the distinct and integral offices of the 
eye, the muscles, the stomach, skin, &c. Or, as if in 
chemistry, sublimation, crystallization, affinity, and radia- 
tion, were given as the result of its analysis, or as a list of 
elements, instead of the individual earths, alkalies, metallic 
bases, and gases, with their respective habitudes and 
powers. 

Other sets of thinkers, however, have aimed at elementary 
discovery. One kind or class of these has endeavored to 
ascertain the simple elements of which all our knowledge 
consists. These occupy themselves with the objects of mind 
primarily, and thence infer the faculties concerned with 
them. Another class subjects the mind itself, or intends so 
to do, to investigation. We will very briefly notice both. 

• The categories of Aristotle are based upon the first men- 
tioned of these methods of research. But, beside a faulty 
limitation to material objects, his classification is broadly 
generic, often including many predicates of the object under 
a single general term. His category of quantity, for 
instance, must include all that falls within the two provinces 
of arithmetic and geometry, at least, and perhaps still more. 
There is no other place in his scheme for number and figure, 
or for order, color and weight. Here then are five condi- 
tions of objects which may require as many varied perceptive 
powers in the mind; and the category fails of its proper use 
in suggesting them. With the exception of his first and 
seventh category, he has, perhaps, not indicated the correla- 
tive in objective things, of any of the simple faculties by 
which they must be apprehended, judged, or conceived. 



212 METAPHYSICS. 

But the method is intrinsically bad. The universe of 
things is resolvable to intelligent beings only in coincidence 
with the faculties and capacities which they possess, and 
when these are the aim of discovery they are most directly and 
successfully examined in themselves. The system of nature 
may be a very difficult thing as it stands to the apprehension 
of inferior animals, of men, and of angels. The perceptive 
powers of either of these several orders of beings, are, there- 
fore, not certainly inferred by an analysis of nature, made 
by either for the other. A dog has no notion of religious 
devotion or of its object; an angel may, for aught we know, 
have some faculty by which he sees immediately the chemi- 
cal constitution of a crystal, as we perceive its form and 
color, at a glance. 

Moreover, were a perfect analysis of the external world 
made for us, it does not follow that our faculties shall 
correspond in number and quality to the elements so 
obtained. A small number of primitive mental powers may 
stand addressed to all that we can know by them of the 
whole material creation; while a dozen others or a score 
may be conceived of as concerned with wife, child, or friend. 

The mind itself must be anatomized to reveal its constitu- 
tion. The categories of Kant are based upon this better 
devised method and better chosen object of investigation. 

His most general or highest classification of the human fa- 
culties is into sensational perception, understanding, and, pure 
reason. The two former of these classes he subdivides into 
fourteen categories, or, as he expresses it, the fourteen con- 
ceptions in relation to which everything really existing must 
be viewed. This phrase in itself gives us warning that we 
must not expect an ultimate analysis pushed to elementary 
simplicity, but only certain conceptions which the mind must 
take of all its objects. By looking critically into these con- 



METAPHYSICS. 213 

ceptions, it will appear that several of them may be the 
work of a single faculty, and that of several others each 
embraces the primary services of many faculties at once. 

The forms of sensation he reduces to time and space. 
The first of these is probably the function of a single power, 
but how any single power can be supposed to receive all the 
properties and conditions of material objects except those 
embraced under the faculty of time, is quite beyond compre- 
hension. If space includes only the simple notions of size, 
locality, form and order, we have already a vicious general- 
ization, that at best affords us only products, and conceals 
the factors. He has, indeed, made provision for some of 
the ideas and offices of sensation under his second general 
class, understanding; only some of them, however, and these 
seem to be unwarrantably dislocated. 

The laws of the understanding he reduces to twelve. 
Remark, Laws, for they are not faculties, properly, but 
modes of mental action, or general notions of its offices — ■ 
these twelve are made to fall within four principal or head- 
categories, viz. quantity, quality, relation and modality. 
Under quantity he gives us unity, plurality, totality. This 
seems to be only a grammatical generalization, not a philo- 
sophical analysis of the subject. Now, there may be a single 
power for the perception or cognition of number, and ano- 
ther for size, and still another for form. If so, is not the 
first adequate to the several ideas of unity and plurality, 
while the same power, or some other, shall have the capa- 
city of comparing the perception with another idea and so 
settle its totality. The same things are very probable of 
size and form. But if the categories do not mean element- 
ary perceptions, or judgments, then, they are not the ana- 
lysis demanded, but may be some kind of generalization of 
them. 



214 METAPHYSICS. 

That naturarobjects have qualities is very certain, and it 
is just as certain that we have the faculties by which they 
are perceived and distinguished, but they are very numer- 
ous, and Kant's subdivision of quality into affirmation, nega- 
tion, and limitation, is certainly no specific list of them. 
Nor is it intended to be, but rather certain resultants of 
reflection upon them. The problem of mental science con- 
cerning the qualities of things is, what are the perceptive 
powers by which we know them ? Kant does not attempt 
this ; his search is for laws — our demand is for elements 
and their laws. 

Under the head of Relation, he gives us substance, 
causality, and reciprocity. That we have a faculty by 
which we have the idea of substance, and that this idea is 
intuitive, the ground of the natural conviction that all 
qualities inhere in, and are supported by, some subject — in 
other words, that the objectivities of mind are not a mere 
phantasmagoria of phenomena, as Pyrrho and Berkley 
thought, is a very admissible, if not a necessary, proposition. 
And, that we have another elementary faculty by which we 
have the idea of causation is also logical enough. And so 
we pass these without excepting to them. In our appre- 
hension of them they are true in themselves and answer the 
inquiries which we put, so far as they go. But as a part 
of his classification they are vitiated by an unmethodical 
collocation, and erroneous tendencies in theory. They are 
incongruously woven into a web of very abstruse theorizing. 
They are not put availably at the service of theoretical 
science and all its practical uses. 

Under the head of Modality, are contained possibility, 
actuality, and necessity, which may be the poetic or tran- 
scendental rendering of the topic, but it gives no hint of the 
mental constitution or the primitive faculties, by which these 



M ETAPH Y SI C S. 215 

logical gymnastics are accomplished. It is not the retorts, 
the scales and weights, the manipulating formulae of the 
laboratory, that we require, but the elements to be obtained 
by them ; and then all the laws and history of the process, 
by way of notes and inductions. It is not the statuary, but 
the bones, muscles, glands, nerves, bloodvessels, of the 
mind, with the laws of all its diverse functions in detail, 
which are required for the utilities of science. 

To the pure reason he attributes three irreducible ideas — • 
the soul, the universe, and God. By the pure reason, then, 
he must mean all those original faculties which achieve these 
irreducible ideas. What are they ? Severing the head- 
category from the others only indicates that we have not 
these three ideas either through the sensations or the under- 
standing. This is all the analysis it gives us, and this is the 
extent to which it penetrates the grand problem of mind. 

Nothing is done for the idea of God by calling it irredu- 
cible. And we may well question the notion, for, causality, 
the devotional sentiment, the instinct of supernaturality, 
hope, the feeling of the sublime, the sympathies with good- 
ness, aye, even the passions, are all elements and sugges- 
tions of the great conception. 

Indeed it is not easy to see why, so far as the symmetry 
of classification and nomenclature are concerned, he might 
not as well have clustered these three ideas under that 
category of the understanding which he calls quantity, and 
subdivides into unity (plurality) and totality, taken in con- 
nection with the other categories of substance ; for, the soul 
he conceives of as the absolute subject, the universe as the 
totality of all phenomena, and God as the all-perfect essence. 
Here are the substance, the unity, and the totality of the un- 
derstanding, and very probably they are that very pure 
reason which he is endeavoring to eliminate from the mixture. 



216 METAPHYSICS. 

This is not Tery respectful to the categories, but the im- 
patience betrayed springs from respect for scientific truth 
maltreated. 

That the essential drift of this method is in the direction 
of generalization and not analysis, is shown very well and 
clearly by its final issue in the hands of its most distin- 
guished disciples. M. Cousin, " one of the first of living 
philosophers," says Mr. Morell, "has criticised the labors 
of Kant, and has reduced the whole of the Kantian cate- 
gories to two fundamental ideas P " According to Cousin 
all our thoughts may be reduced to the two primitive ideas 
of action and being." Is it not obvious that the metaphysi- 
cians of this school by analysis really mean combination, 
and by primitive intend complex. 

Our apprehension of their science of mind is thus vindi- 
cated : It is neither a natural history, a descriptive 
anatomy, a special physiology, nor a chemistry, of the 
mental constitution. It does not analyze the soil, botanize 
the harvest, nor garner the diversified fruits, but it opens a 
sort of rectifying distillery and extracts their proof spirit. 

That the researches of the two or three hundred historic 
metaphysicians who have flourished from Pythagoras down 
to Sir W. Hamilton, have turned up much truth of the 
kind, and in the form, required by a legitimate science, is un- 
questionably true. But, that not one of them has been able 
to construct a system which any other in this long list 
accepts, is a significant fact, which is itself the severest 
possible criticism upon the whole tribe. 

Their work lies yet in the condition of the earth on the 
first demiurgic day ; we see the light, that it is good, but 
it is not yet divided from the darkness. When its beams 
shall be rolled up in the order of a completed system, some 
of them will shine as stars in the firmament, to give light 



METAPHYSICS. 21? 

upon the earth. We must wait for the creation of the great 
lights, that are to rule over the day and over the night, and 
to divide the lmmt from the darkness. 



VIII. 

Sources of the data — Observation — Consciousness — Their respective offices — The 
animal kingdom, nature's chemistry of the functions common -to man and ani- 
mals — Comparative psychology — Data derived from mental and moral differences 
in the sexes — From differences among men of genius — Tests of functional simpli- 
city — Physiognomy — Indications of e'ements in the cerebral structure — Human 
actions indicate special faculties — Grammatical indicia of primitive powers — 
Sphere and services of Consciousness— Limitation of its office — Reflective facul- 
ties, the analysts of mental phenomena. 

To attain a true psychology we must know all the facts 
of the mental constitution — all the varied phenomena which 
its action displays, and all the laws which govern them. 
Our means for obtaining the knowledge of the facts requir- 
ed, are of two kinds. We can oh serve some of its phenomena, 
and the conditions of their manifestation, as we examine and 
collect the facts of the world without ; and, by our con- 
sciousness, we can know other facts, which are not thus open 
to observation by the senses. Consciousness, indeed, covers 
the whole field of this research, and so casts a cross-light 
upon that department of the inquiry to which observation 
is limited, while it has exclusive cognizance of another 
eminently important division of the data demanded. The 
materials contributed by both these means are alike the sub- 
jects of our reflective faculties, in their proper work of 
eliciting and arranging the resulting truths, and giving 
them their scientific effect. Observation and consciousness 
are the miners and common carriers — the reflecting faculties 

10 



218 METAPHYSICS. 

are the assayers and comers of the ore for use and cur- 
rency. 

It is not true, as the metaphysicians allege, that the facts 
of mental phenomena are wholly and exclusively a matter 
of consciousness. Instrument ally, the mind's working pow- 
ers are connected with, and modified by, the physical organ- 
ism which it inhabits ; and we might as well be limited to 
our consciousness in learning the facts and laws of respira- 
tion, to the neglect of the mechanism and movements of 
the chest, as thus to restrict the exploration of the mind's 
functions. 

If the method of biped progression, the possession of 
hands of a particular formation, and a forehead nearly ver- 
tical to the face, are together the signs of the highest order 
of intelligent beings, the facts may be, and probably are, 
material to a thorough knowledge of the subject. It is 
unphilosophical to exclude any fact, always present, from 
the consideration of any question ; because, it cannot be 
insignificant. 

Moreover, the fruitlessness of the ancient logic, as an 
instrument of discovery in physics, is well exposed by its 
failures, and even better proved by the successes of the 
modern method by analysis ; and mental science, to this 
day, is another reproach of the purely speculative system 
of philosophizing. Naturalists have demonstrated that the 
immensely diversified animal life of our globe is effected by 
the permutation of a determinate number of essential pow- 
ers, and a distribution of them, in varied number and com- 
binations, among the several species of sentient beings. 
From the lowest and simplest natures up to the highest 
and most complex, the ascending series is marked by a regu- 
larly progressive superaddition of faculties, at every stage, 
to the endowments appropriated to that next below, until 



METAPHYSICS. 219 

man is reached, at the top of the scale, in whose constitu- 
tion they are all reproduced, and afterwards crowned by 
still nobler qualities and capacities which are peculiar to 
him. Here, then, we have an analysis, or division of the 
elements, and a distinctive exhibition of them accomplished 
by nature's own chemistry ; and it is simply absurd to refuse 
its teachings. Surely something of value may be learned 
by observing the qualities of our own nature, whether they 
belong to mind or body, as they stand decomposed in the 
riving beings around us. A phenomenon of our own nature 
challenges inquiry — but, for the reason that it always carries 
the form of unity in manifestation, it may seem to our con- 
sciousness to be single and simple. Xow, suppose that 
something of the same kind of fact occurs also in an inferior 
animal, where it appears as a simple endowment, but evi- 
dently lacks an ingredient found in the human form. Is it 
not clear that the difference between these two phenomena, 
thus shown, must be a distinct element in the human quality ? 
And is it not so proved to be complex ? 

The system of nature so displayed, may properly be made 
to serve as a chemistry of mind, and its study cannot fail 
to instruct, to the extent that it is capable of solving the 
great problem. Our own social instincts appear thus decom- 
posed and distinguished for our use in the variously distri- 
buted endowments of the animal kingdom. For instance : 

Sheep are gregarious or attached to society ; but there 
is no exclusive or constant attachment between the sexes ; 
and, they have nothing of the family institution. Foxes 
are married for life ; they live in family, and, they are not 
societary. Bees and beavers have political institutions, over 
and above their gregariousness ; while" sheep have no civil 
polity. 

Here is an analysis, so far as it goes, of the social 



220 METAPHYSICS. 

instincts, and we have it proved that the elements are thus 
distinct in nature ; and a just inference is afforded that 
they lie thus distinguishable in the human constitution, 
which other modes of examination and proof may either 
confirm, rectify, or push to still minuter divisions. The 
phenomena in question may be capable of still further 
severance into their elements by our consciousness and 
reasoning powers ; but here are facts of observation which 
we cannot safely overlook ; for here are divisions which 
must be valid, because they are live truths in the logic of 
nature, and are, therefore, something better verified than 
mere speculation upon consciousness can always be sure of. 
Reasoning may disintegrate in the endeavor to decompose, 
but the vital wholeness and efficiency of elements found in 
nature justify and authenticate her divisions, so far as she 
carries them. 

In general, then, we may say that, whatsoever man has 
in his constitution which other beings possess only in part, 
is complex in him, and that its analysis is so far rendered 
as essential difference is discernible between the forms in 
which it is respectively manifested ; and that, whatsoever 
he has, of which they have nothing, either in degree or 
kind, must be distinct in his constitution from those other 
things which he has in common with them. 

A further analysis is afforded by the differences in the 
intellectual, moral, and instinctive characteristics of the two 
sexes of our own species. 

All differences, which are not merely those of degree or 
of application, may be taken to indicate a distinctiveness 
in the elementary faculties from which they must emanate. 
If, for instance, intellect predominates in man, and emotion 
in woman, then emotion is not a result of intellect — it is 
something else, for it is not in proportion to its supposed 



METAPHYSICS. 221 

cause. If one mode of intellection appears in man, and 
another in woman, bearing no constant proportion to each 
other in either, then, intellect is complex, and in the parti- 
culars exhibited ; and the sexual differences suggest the 
elements that produce these unlike results. 

On the same ground : If the domestic affections are 
regularly stronger in women than in men, the higher moral 
feelings being equal, the love of offspring is not merely a 
manner of action of the moral sentiments, but is essentially 
distinct from them. 

Here again are facts which consciousness and reflection 
alone may, indeed, discern, but cannot distinguish with any 
decided certitude, without the helps and corrections of 
observation. At least, they are not the only, or the best, 
instruments of inquiry in the case. 

Again : a particular capability of mind not proportioned 
to others in the same individual reveals a distinctiveness of 
functions, and divides offices of mind into specialties, either 
in their ultimate simplicity or approaching it. 

If Newton could not have written the " Paradise Lost," 
nor Milton the "Principia," the fact is proclaimed that 
some particular faculty or faculties, were respectively stronger 
and some weaker in each of these men, than were the others 
which their relatively greater and less abilities exhibited. 
That which was strongest in each must have been a different 
tiring from that which was weakest — great inductive powers 
are not the same, or any modification of the same, primitive 
faculties which afford superior poetical capabilities. Con- 
sciousness and observation thus applied are both competent 
witnesses to the facts involved in this process, but each 
affords a different light, and a correcting test of the truths 
sought, and neither must be rejected. The principle which 
thus directs in the exploration of elementary differences 



222 METAPHYSICS. 

runs through the entire intellectual and moral nature of 
man. 

When a function of mind is observed to be capable 
of acting and of reposing singly, it may still be complex, 
but it is certainly separate from all other functions, and is 
to be referred to a fundamental power until it is further 
decomposed by other tests. 

A function that may singly preserve its health, or be 
affected by disease, bears the same mark of constitutional 
severance from its kindred powers. 

"Where eminent arithmetical talent is found in an idiot, or 
in one whose other intellectual faculties are morbidly dis- 
qualified for their offices, it is clearly independent of them in 
nature and office. Cases of monomania, and the phenomena 
of dreams, in both of which one power only is sometimes 
affected, while the others remain intact, afford evidence, 
in their way, of the specialties of endowment that are 
to be sought for. 

We have already indicated half a dozen varied means of 
tracing the complex facts of mind toward their primitive 
origins in its organization. Logically employed, they will 
safely limit, rectify, and verify each other, and their harmon- 
ized results must be legitimate. 

But observation has, beside all these, a very important 
field of research in the organism concerned in displaying the 
actions and affections of the mind. A smile, a tear, a frown, 
a pale cheek and tremulous lip, and a flushed face and flash- 
ing eye, are the respective signs of emotions which are 
probably as distinct from each other in their origins as their 
physiognomical symbols are different. Tones of voice, and 
gestures and attitudes of the body, are the appropriate in- 
dications of unlike feelings, and they suggest inquiry for their 
respective impulses in the spiritual mechanism. Some of 



METAPHYSICS. 223 

them, or all of them, may be equivocal, under a partial 
view; but follow them wherever they present themselves in 
sensitive beings, in many individuals and circumstances, and 
then correct the inductions by the other modes of investiga- 
tion which justly apply, and the truth sought will be attained 
or approached with security and certainty. 

The fixed forms of the organism immediately concerned in 
the offices of the mind are necessarily among the most pro- 
mising indicia of the facts to be discovered. If the brain is 
the nearest instrument of the thinking and feeling powers of 
the soul, or as it is stated by the highest authorities, both 
in physiology and psychology, if " cerebral development is 
inseparably connected with mental manifestation," the ana- 
tomy of the brain is of prime importance to the philosophy 
of mind. Structure does not teach function in an organ 
whose office is not mechanical, but there is neverthe- 
less a relation between structure and function which, in a 
useful and reliable way, may be made to direct research 
and secure its proper results. When the general uses of a 
vital part are once well ascertained, its modifications of 
structure, seen in the light of philosophical principles, must 
be good evidence of corresponding differences of office. 
Nature never varies her instruments, in form or quality, but 
to produce varied results; and, organic differences, there- 
fore, always prove corresponding varieties of action and 
use. No two organs in the body, having unlike forms and 
other qualities of structure, have similar offices in the living 
economy. The brain of an animal, commissioned to exert a 
certain set of instinctive faculties, will always be found to 
differ appreciably from the brain of another with dissimilar 
impulses and capabilities. All that science needs in order 
to distinguish and classify these offices, and compare them, 
so as to know what the structural differences indicate, is to 



224 METAPHYSICS. 

have the power of philosophically interpreting the signs 
offered to the senses. And the principle is so pervading 
and comprehensive that, if all differences in the structure of 
the same brain could be clearly discerned and estimated, 
the physical apparatus would stand decomposed to the 
senses, and the corresponding mental organization would be 
so far clearly proclaimed. We could say that the mind has 
at least as many different functions as require all these 
differences of organism for its manifestation. And, if it 
were also ascertained that no power of mind can be in any- 
wise exerted except in connection with a fitting material 
apparatus, then we would have an absolutely ultimate, a 
thoroughly simplified, analysis of all its operative faculties. 

I do not know, or believe, that phrenology proper has so 
large an office as this. It has certainly not yet covered all 
this ground ; and from certain intrinsic difficulties in its 
method, w T e cannot expect so much from it. But cerebral 
anatomy and physiology are, nevertheless, to say the least, 
very hopeful auxiliaries in the work of constructing a com- 
plete psychology. 

If certain distinguishable forms of brain are found to be 
invariable accompaniments of special mental characters or 
qualities, such differences of form must be taken to prove 
that the associated faculties are not accidental modifications 
of the very same elements, but must needs arise from primi- 
tively different elements. 

The help which structure can afford in analysing functions 
is well illustrated by the organic apparatus of two of the 
external senses — taste and smell. It might not be possible 
so to distinguish odors from savors as to refer them, with 
unquestionable certainty, to distinct nervous functions, were 
it not that the respective organisms of the mouth and nose 
exhibit and prove the severance. If the olfctorv and gus- 



METAPHYSICS. 225 

tatory nerves were both distributed in confusion upon the 
surface of the same cavity we might confound them, in spite 
of consciousness and reflection, and suppose taste and smell 
to be only modifications of a single sense. It is sometimes 
very difficult, if not impossible, to determine whether the 
vapors issuing from a bakery are smelled or tasted. In this 
way organic structure, wherever it availably exists, is 
always a safe guide, and sometimes an indispensable one, to 
functional analysis; because, however nice or dubious the 
distinctions in theory may be, the fact is unquestionable 
when so avouched. For example : if in constant connection 
with eminent inductive faculties, a certain form of brain 
could be noted; and, a different form were, in like manner, 
found to accompany the method of reasoning styled analo- 
gical, and these invariably, so that the one form should be 
the physiognomical sign of the one method of reasoning, and 
the other form the sign of the other method, an analysis of 
the reflective faculties [would be so far furnished that we 
should know independently of consciousness, and more 
certainly than it could prove the fact, that analogy and 
induction are not convertible modes of one and the same 
elementary power or powers. 

It is now a well-established doctrine among naturalists 
that the human brain, in its gradual formation, assumes, at 
its successive stages of growth, the various types which char- 
acterize the whole animal creation below the rank of man, 
and that man's cerebral superiority consists of superaddi- 
tions made upon that of the inferior tribes of beings. This 
fact ascertained, it follows that, in the varied structure of 
animal brains there are the natural signs of all their varied 
functions, in elementary distinctness — that, as one organ of 
a primitive power after another is added all along the 
ascending series until man is reached, philosophy has in this 

10* 



226 METAPHYSICS. 

legible record of progressive development an absolute de- 
monstration of the divisions into which the corresponding 
endowments of humanity naturally fall. Cerebral anatomy 
is, on these grounds, a legitimate department of mental 
science, so far as the instincts and intellectual powers of 
animals reach. And it is a safe inference to make from 
observations thus far established, that the form, size, and 
other properties of brain, are hints, helps, and proofs of in- 
tellectual and moral qualities, from that point upwards at 
which the parallel ceases. The brain is, doubtless, the im- 
mediate organ of all the soul's powers, and the economy of 
its structure, and the policy of its vital laws, are, very 
probably, coherent and integrally consistent throughout. 

Phrenology, for such reasons as these, lays just claim to a 
prominent position among the means of mental analysis. 

Observation has at least two other spheres of service, 
besides those already suggested, whose facts, under correc- 
tion of consciousness and the guidance of philosophic reason- 
ing, must be taken into the inquiry. 

1st. Due attention to the conduct of men. Actions are 
the effects of sentiments, affections, passions and determinate 
intellectual forces, and these effects, in many instances, in- 
dicate their specific causes. The conduct of parents to their 
children shows parental affection to be a determinate im- 
pulse of humanity. All its combinations with other feel- 
ings and ideas, and all the modifications within itself, which 
it manifests, serve rather to individualize than to confuse 
it to our conceptions. Again : man is proved by his history 
to be a social being ; and the manifestations of his affection, 
esteem, admiration, resentment, approbation, love, and all 
his other dispositions toward his kind, serve, in like manner, 
to indicate the constitution of mind from which they flow. 

Love of offspring, love of sex, of home, of society, of 



METAPHYSICS. 227 

wealth, of justice, pride, vanity, benevolence, religious 
devotion, faith in the supernatural, the sense of the beauti- 
ful, sympathy with goodness, hopefulness without reasonable 
cause — are all well distinguished from each other in action, 
object and use, and are certainly distinct, if not severally 
single, in constitution ; and may be made to confess their 
intrinsic character under the tests of simplicity which we 
have at command. 

The functional categories of the knowing powers are, also, 
signified by their respective manners of action, objects and 
final aims ; and, if we are careful to look for simply integral 
powers, and as careful to avoid confounding them with mere 
degrees of their activity, diversities of application, and with 
the necessary incidents of their operation, we may, under 
the criticism of all our other means of inquiry, discover them 
in their individual distinctness. 

2d. Attention to the structure of language cannot fail to 
throw much light upon the facts of this search. Words 
express the thoughts and feelings of the mind, and language 
takes its forms and laws from the mental constitution. We 
can, however, expect only those distinctions which the com- 
mon business of life requires. Distinct things are not always 
distinguished in expression ; and, it is further to be remem- 
bered that, oral language is not adequate to all the varieties 
of human thought and emotion. Nevertheless, there are 
to be observed in all languages those constitutional tenden- 
cies of mental action which proclaim to a certain extent, very 
clearly, the intrinsic structure of the thinking agent. They 
all have nouns, substantive and adjective ; verbs, active and 
passive ; tenses, moods, persons and number. There is a 
universal grammar, which shows a universal agreement in 
the things upon which it is founded. If any people believed 
or could conceive attributes without a subject, then their 



228 METAPHYSICS. 

adjectives would be independent words ; and would make 
sense without a substantive. The qualities of things are 
immediately received through our sensations of them ; but 
it is some instinctive and inevitable suggestion of the mind 
itself which conceives and supplies a substance in which they 
inhere. This observation teaches at least .this much of the 
mental organization ; that, the perceptive powers are dis- 
tinct in office and nature from that faculty or faculties which 
conceive or apprehend substance ; and we are put so far 
on our way in our analysis, and prompted by the logical 
principle thence derived to go further. 

The plural number of nouns proves that all nations have 
notions of attributes which are common to many individuals ; 
from which the metaphysicians might have learned that 
many separate and distinct agencies may have common pro- 
perties of certain kinds, however unlike in other respects, 
and that the detection of such common properties is very 
far from a complete practical knowledge of individualities ; 
and, that generalization of formal qualities is not the same 
thing as analysis of entities. 

Active verbs show the universality of the idea of causa- 
tion, and that some intellectual impulse, inherent and essen- 
tial to mind, puts every intelligent being upon the question, 
why ? and prompts him to look for a cause for every effect. 
This fact starts the inquiry, is causation the suggestion of a 
special faculty whose office is a necessary ingredient in the 
process of induction ? And, it further suggests that reason- 
ing by comparison, as it is obviously a different movement 
of mind, must be a distinct power, and starts again the still 
further question, is analogical reasoning simple or complex ? 

And so of all the forms of speech, and the channels of 
thought which they show to be fixed and necessary methods 
of mind in its varied offices. 



METAPHYSICS. 229 

Consciousness, as an instrument for exploring the special- 
ties of the mental structure remains to be considered. 

We have defined it to be the immediate knowledge we 
have of the operations of our own minds ; we conceive of it 
as inseparable from the idea of mind, and of mind as in- 
conceivable without it. To say that we are conscious of a 
thought, or feeling, is to say that we know, discern, distin- 
guish, feel, or apprehend our mental actions and states, and 
can examine, remember and judge of them, as of any other 
objects of intellection ; and all this supposes, besides, that 
we have certain faculties of mind which have the processes 
of the others for their objects. 

Xow, if the mind be an apparatus of numerous parts — 
an assemblage of many dissimilar powers, this consciousness 
which belongs to them all must be a competent reporter of 
their experiences ; and the reflecting faculties which have 
cognizance and judgment of the record, will find in it the 
means for distinguishing the specific kinds of mentality which 
it imports. Consciousness being no more than the feeling 
or perception of the facts and conditions occurring, is not 
the analyst of their essences or elements, and is by no means 
the scientific expositor of the relations, classifications, and 
laws of the facts which it furnishes. This is the proper 
office of the reasoning powers, and they must examine the 
evidence so furnished, under all the lights and guides which 
scientific truth demands. 

I am conscious of loving and of hating, and I feel distinctly 
the difference between the respective sensations, but, whether 
these emotions are merely opposite motions of the self-same 
faculty, or modes of action of different members of the 
mental fabric, is not yet determined. I am conscious of an 
emotion of vanity, and again, I feel the sentiment of pride : 
these feelings are consciously dissimilar, but, are they only 



230 METAPHYSICS. 

less or more of the same passion — modifications of the same 
thing induced by difference of inducing causes ? Does the 
one include the other with some elementary feeling added ? 
or, are they wholly separate and independent of each other ? 
The solution of these problems belongs not to the witnessing 
consciousness, but to the judging reason, and they are to be 
examined in every light that all the means of knowledge 
respecting them can supply. 

Every movement of feeling has a peculiar sensation, 
whether it passes only through degrees, or is complicated in 
kind. Probably the experienced sensations of no moment 
are ever exactly and simply repeated in the course of a life- 
time. Consciousness of sensations is therefore strictly 
historical, but analysis — the reference of every state of feel- 
ing to its elementary origin, the distribution of the mental 
phenomena into their organic individualities, and the classi- 
fication of these according to species, genera, and whatever 
higher and more general groups they are capable of, is 
necessarily the work of the high reflecting powers of the 
mind. 

The office of consciousness in collecting the required data 
is probably broader and more comprehensive than that of 
any other agency appointed to this service, inasmuch *as, 
besides witnessing within us, in its own way, all the facts 
which correspond to those which lie also in the province of 
observation without, it has intimate cognizance of our in- 
tuitions and inspirations, and the very processes which 
originate, modify, and limit the life of the soul in the body; 
but it must, nevertheless, be recollected that its simple 
knowledges are not a philosophical system of the facts and 
laws involved. 

There are, doubtless, still other sources of knowledge 
concerning our subject than those adverted to, and other 



METAPHYSICS. 231 

methods of employing them than those which we have 
noticed ; but it was not the aim of these essays to invent a 
" Xovitoi Orgauum" of mental science. I have not un- 
dertaken the ambitious task of laying down the laws, limit- 
ing the field, prescribing the method, and furnishing the 
formulas of the processes to be pursued. I have ventured 
only to present certain plain reflections upon the principles 
and policy of the methods hitherto employed, with a view 
to bring into relief some very general and incomplete, but I 
trust useful suggestions, touching the methodology of mental 
science, which I proceed now to submit. 



IX. 



Methodology of Mental Science — Respective uses of Idealogy and Phrenology — 
What is a Psychology, its uses — What is an Elementary faculty — Br Gall, his de- 
.fects — Spurzheim — Principles, rule, observations — Empirical method exposed, 
Concentrativeness — Speculation corrected by observation — Conscience an ex- 
ample of Phrenological analysis — Sensations and Perceptions Distinguished — 
Spurzheim's achievement in the theory of perception — His Works — Objections of 
Anatomists, Magendie and Bell — Phrenology not a mere anatomy of the Brain, 
but an integral Psychology — Anatomical criticism — Craniology, it's limitations — 
A Shaksperian analyst of mind required to complete the phrenological system- — 
Estimate of Phrenology, 

Our reflections upon analysis and generalization in Meta- 
physical science expose the fact, that notwithstanding the 
precision of their received verbal definitions, the practical 
employment of them has been far from determinate, method- 
ical or answerable to the intention. 

Our present concern is to determine how they must be 
employed, and with what drift, in psychology. 

We answer — that we look for two distinct sciences of the 



232 METAPHYSICS. 

mind, or two dissimilar methods of treating the common 
subject : One, which corresponds to the general Anatomy 
of the body in manner and aim, we have in the recorded 
labors of the metaphysicians of twenty-five centuries, in 
such perfection as they could give it. This system as we 
have seen, occupies itself mainly, if not exclusively, with 
modes of mental action, following the processes of sensation, 
perception, reflection, and consciousness, analytically, 
indeed, but in effect historically, throughout the whole range 
of mental phenomena. — The other system, that which cor- 
responds to the descriptive anatomy of the animal fabric ; 
undertaking, and charging itself with the determination of 
the fundamentally integral faculties of the psychical consti- 
tution, and which has not so much as been attempted un- 
derstandingly by any but the phrenologists. They have 
done their work well, and have given us a method at least, 
if not a perfect science, whose results amply justify its pre- 
tensions, and promise all that is attainable in useful knowl- 
edge of the great subject. 

But there is really no conflict between these two systems, 
any more than between the general and special anatomies of 
the schools of medicine, unless when they are unwarrantably 
put into a conflict of pretensions. All inquiry, normally 
conducted, into the generalities of mind, after the manner of 
the metaphysicians is right, valuable, and necessary, in pro- 
portion to its success ; and, every achievement of the 
phrenological method of research and reasoning is, in like 
manner, to be estimated by the uses, theoretical and practi- 
cal, which it answers. And it has obviously this eminence 
of relative rank that, it necessarily includes all the general 
truths which its reciprocal and cognate philosophy contains, 
while it carries its own forward into the foreground formal 
constitution of the mind, and affords a basis for the regulative 



METAPHYSICS. 233 

Sciences which must be built upon its actual working powers 
and laws of movement. Education, physical, moral and in- 
tellectual, RemediaJ medicine, Ethnology,- Civil govern- 
ment, and the science of Character, when that shall be un- 
dertaken, must all depend upon a special psychology, of 
which Phrenology is the ground- work and the hope. 

To justify this judgment of the new science, which Dr. 
Gall discovered and Dr. Spurzheim constructed, we offer 
some general considerations upon its principles and their 
issues : 

The mind is an agent. It has functions. And, it is 
adapted to them by its constitutional endowments. For 
every several office it must have a specially adapted power, 
which may be called a propensity, a sentiment, or an intel- 
lectual faculty, according to its nature and aim. It may 
have a dozen or a hundred of such diverse endowments, 
each qualified for, and appointed to, its own particular use. 
The scientific knowledge of the mind must, therefore, em- 
brace the discerning and distinguishing of these, their rela- 
tions to their objects, the spheres and conditions of their 
several activities, the effects of their combinations, and all 
the laws and facts of their respective agencies. 

The facts which belong to several, or all, of them alike, 
abstractly regarded, is not the end of this search. Neither 
Is simplicity of action * or object the guide and directory of 
the required analysis. A single mechanical instrument, as 
the lever, screw, or pulley, may have many applications ; a 
single organ of the body has relations to many objects ; a 
single function of the mind has obviously many ultimate uses 
The eye sees green, white, blue, form, size, number, order, 
distance ; it is the one organic medium of a thousand modi 
fications of light. In like manner, the single elementary 
sentiment of religious worship may be^ capable of adoring a 



234 METAPHYSICS. 

stock, a stone, a star, a man, a demon, an angel, or the true 
God ; or, all of them in turn, or together. Here, there is, 
indeed, simplicity of impulse, but complication of objects and 
results ; and the states of the sentiment may well be as 
varied as those of the optic nerve must be in the large range 
of vision. A single faculty can have but one kind of func- 
tion ; but oneness of office, oneness of application, and one- 
ness of constitution and character in its objects, are very 
different things. The love of offspring may be a specific in- 
stinct, and severed in the mental apparatus from the other 
propensities whose office is love, indeed, but love of some 
other kind, and serving some unlike necessity of our lives. 
Nor does it follow that every compound feeling, which, 
owing to the poverty of language, we call by the general 
appellation love, must necessarily have its special working 
power in the mental organization. A multitude of objects 
may fall within the sphere of a single power, provided only 
that its fundamental action is adjusted to them all, or, to 
something in each common to them all. 

In such complexity of results consciousness and reflection 
are not always the reliable analysts of the process, and it is 
just here that phrenology brings to bear the tests of form 
and structure, to determine distinctness of faculty. But its 
testimony must be held under correction of speculative 
principles wherever these can justify themselves and their 
authority. 

Dr. Gall had eminent observing talents, but very little 
speculative discrimination. He denied the possibility of 
classing the mental powers in kinds, according to their dis- 
tinctive natures ; and he even named some of the organs 
after their abuses, which shows that he looked at actions and 
results which are variable, instead of at powers which nre 
inherent and essential. This great error Spurzheim avoided ; 



METAPHYSICS. 235 

but his authority has not been sufficient to restrain certain 
of his disciples, who are commonly regarded as the exposi- 
tors of his science, from imitating the empirical procedure 
of Gall, and so exposing phrenology to the just criticism of 
sounder thinkers, who are at the same time prejudiced 
against it. 

George Combe's organ of concentrativeness is a striking 
instance of a craniological blunder, which a little philoso- 
phical reasoning easily corrects. Let skulls testify what 
they may, and with whatever concentrativeness upon this 
supposed faculty, a sound logic pronounces it simply impos- 
sible, and justly rejects their testimony to any such effect. 
When it is once established that attention is not, and cannot 
be a specific faculty of mind, the combined attention of any 
number of its faculties cannot be a distinct and elementary 
one, but is merely a name for the active states of as many as 
happen to be embraced in the process concerned. A pro- 
tuberance on the skull cannot prove a faculty which cannot 
be* in the mind. What it denotes, even if occurring con- 
stantly where the character of the man is remarkable for 
concentrativeness, is to be sought for ; because, it is quite 
impossible for it to designate this non-existent thing. 

This is an example of the way in which the settled prin- 
ciples of speculative reasoning limit and rectify the crude 
suggestions of anatomical or craniological observation. 

Dr. Gall at first called the whole front lobe of the brain 
the organ of educability, and all his observations justified 
this lumping analysis. For years he supposed that a certain 
protuberance at the occiput indicated great nervous sensi- 
bility, but was aware of exceptions, and so refused to adopt 
it, although he found it predominant in women. When he 
observed it just as conspicuous in the heads of monkeys he 
entirely abandoned his former idea, and ascribed to it the 



236 METAPHYSICS. 

function of love of offspring, and found this notion accordant 
with all examples, and Dr. Spurzheira demonstrated its con- 
sistency with theoretical truth, after he had attained to that 
stage of his discoveries which let in the light of metaphysical 
science upon the facts of physical observation. 

On the other hand : a principle ascertained by phrenolo- 
gical discovery is competent to resolve some problems to 
which reflective consciousness is not so clearly adequate. It 
shows, for instance, that conscience is neither a single faculty, 
nor any modified action of such single faculty, and sheds a 
flood of light upon the grand logical and ethical truths con- 
cerned in the question. Having first logically resolved the 
phenomenon into at least three elements, to wit: a recognized 
standard of right, an intellectual comparison of the act sub- 
ject to its authority, and a feeling of pleasure or pain 
resulting ; it proceeds upon its own data and reaches a con- 
clusion that harmonizes with every known fact, and every 
principle of reasoning and conduct which is involved in the 
matter, and so stands demonstrated and immovable. 

Locke denied not only innate ideas and innate moral 
principles, but he also derived the moral feelings from the 
intellect, and treated them as a product of reflection. The 
logicians of his school think that moral principles must be 
proved ; phrenology says they must be felt, and ascribes 
them to primary powers, separate from the intellectual 
faculties, and brings such evidence of this from its own 
sources of knowledge as reflective consciousness cannot 
command. Thus furnished with a ruling principle of the 
subject, it answers the question propounded in this way : 
Acts of conscience are always complex, but not of invariable 
elements. In one case of remorse for crime it recognizes 
the office of the understanding, first, in apprehending the 
law of the subject, next, in apprehending the character of 



METAPHYSICS. 237 

the act to be judged ; and, lastly, in ascertaining the depar- 
ture of the act from the requirements of the standard ; and 
then, the action of a certain determinate emotional power 
which feels and suffers the judgment so pronounced by the 
reflective faculties. The ingredients are, a law, a judge, and 
an executioner. In another case, the process is further com- 
plicated : besides the simple and direct sense of duty to an 
authority, as in the first supposed instance, reverence, grati- 
tude, love for the law-giver, combine with and corroborate 
the obligation ; and, in still another case, in addition to all 
these elements, there are present and operative, compassion 
for the sufferer, and, it may be, regret for the loss of char- 
acter and of personal rectitude. Phrenological science 
besides thus analyzing cases of conscience thoroughly and 
truly settles the question of the validity of its decisions 
satisfactorily. It recognizes elements in the function which 
are each separately, and all together, liable to error ; the 
received standard may be erroneous ; the proceeding of the 
understanding, in comparing the act with its requirements, 
may be a blunder ; the feelings which accidentally mingle in 
the mixture are blind ; and that one especially which is the 
main element of the emotion — that one which is the mere 
hangman of the mind's court of oyer and terminer — is just as 
likely to strangle the condemned innocent as the guilty. 

Conscience, therefore, according to this rendering is not 
God's umpire ; it is not his infallible representative in the 
human bosom ; but a deputy regulator which, though set 
right, is just as liable as the rest of the works to go wrong. 
Its decisions are not our final judgment, as everybody very 
well knows, and here are the reasons for it, as sound in 
ethical philosophy as they are safe and wholesome for the 
direction of conduct. 

The phrenological doctrine that each special office of mind 



238 METAPHYSICS. 

is the function of a several member of the spiritual fabric 
leads to the distinction of the perceptive powers into two 
orders : one external, belonging to the five senses ; and 
one internal, whose office is the reference of these sensations 
of the former to their external or objective causes. 

These internal senses do not necessarily correspond to 
those external, which supply their material. Touch, sight, 
and hearing are all capable of conveying those impressions 
to the mind which give it the idea of size, of form, of number, 
and of order. Now, one faculty for perceiving, remember- 
ing and judging size is enough, however many external 
instruments are concerned in bringing to it the informing 
impressions ; and the same thing is true of form, number, 
and order ; and all these internal perceptive powers would 
be just as necessary and numerous if one organ of sense 
could supply the material for them all. To each perceptive 
power this doctrine ascribes the apprehending of its object, 
the remembering, the imagining, and judging of the thing 
to which it is appropriated, and, of necessity, affirms that in 
all these operations the faculty is equally capable and ex- 
pert. There is no necessity for a higher understanding, a 
"pure reason," or any other faculty than the perceptive 
one, to feel, judge or remember the difference between two 
and three — between red and yellow — between round and 
square — between large and small. And phrenology very 
sensibly looks for none. Its system of these important parts 
of the mind is really the grandest contribution to its philo- 
sophy which the world has ever received. No man, we 
think, who has labored through the libraries of metaphysics 
and physiology for a theory of perception, can lay down 
Spurzheim's exposition of it without shouting Eureka ! 
Independently of the organology of his theory, his discus- 
sion of the questions involved in the functions of sensation 



METAPHYSICS. 239 

and perception presents about all the true philosophy that 
any man can understand and use, which is extant. His 
chapter on the mediate and immediate functions of the ex- 
ternal senses is the most luminous, and the most successful 
essay in all the range of philosophic literature ; and fur- 
nishes, besides, a key to unlock a multitude of the mysteries 
of mind which have hitherto baffled the whole school of 
idealogists. 

The system of mental philosophy which we accept and 
commend is substantially that of Spurzheim, on grounds and 
for reasons, which the compass and object of these essays do 
not allow us to present in detail. They are to be found in 
the series of works of our author, and nowhere else. It 
would be doing the science, and its great apostle, the gross- 
est injury to attempt any other formal presentment of its 
doctrines than he has given in his several treatises upon 
Phrenology, Physiognomy, Insanity, Education, and the 
Anatomy of the brain and nervous system. 

A host of eminent anatomists and physiologists are ar- 
rayed against phrenology, and their objections seem valid to 
mere anatomists and physiologists. In a majority of in- 
stances they are profoundly ignorant of the system which 
they presume to judge. The celebrated Majendie, who 
rightfully divides the honor with Sir Charles Bell of discov- 
ering the double function of the spinal nerves (which, by 
the way, Spurzheim knew and announced, without pausing 
to demonstrate, eight years before either of them), in a clinic 
lecture delivered at the Hotel Dieu, contradicted the 
function assigned by Gall and Spurzheim to the cerebellum, 
on the ground that in the instance in hand, where the func- 
tion had been morbidly and excessively active, the organ 
itself was comparatively small. But, after finishing this sort 
of a demonstration of the fallacy of phrenology, he pro- 



240 METAPHYSICS. 

ceeded to notice that the organ bore all the marks of active 
inflammation during life, and that the patient had died com- 
atose in consequence ! What is the authority of high rank 
in physiological science worth, where such ignorance of the 
system criticised is manifest ? 

Sir Charles Bell did worse than this — he willfully misrep- 
resented both the system and its authors. In a paper read 
before the Royal Society of London, June 19, 1823, he 
holds this language : " The most extravagant departure from 
all the legitimate modes of reasoning, although still under 
color of anatomical observation, is the system of Dr. Gall. 
It is sufficient to say, that without comprehending the grand 
divisions of the nervous system, without a notion of the dis- 
tinct properties of the individual nerves, or having made any 
distinction of the columns of the spinal marrow — without 
even having ascertained the difference of cerebrum and cer- 
ebellum, Gall proceeded to describe the brain as composed 
of many particular and independent organs, and to assign 
to each the residence of some special faculty ! ! ! n 

Sir Charles knew that as long before as the year 1810 
Gall and Spurzheim had published at Paris their great work 
on the anatomy of the nervous system in general, and the 
brain in particular, in eight folio volumes, accompanied with 
an atlas of one hundred plates ; in which, not only all that 
was known, and all that he knew of them in 1823, but a 
world of particulars besides was contained, which commanded 
the admiration of all candid men then, and we may add, 
holds it still. 

From two such experiences as these we derive the rule 
that, it is always safest to look for the truths of a doctrine 
to its friends, and a wholesome warning against allowing an 
enemy to array the forces against which he wars. But, ad- 
mitting both the candor and general competency of anatom- 



METAPHYSICS. 241 

ical objectors, it is to be remembered that anatomy has not 
complete and exclusive jurisdiction of the questions at issue. 

Phrenology is not a mere physiology of the brain ; it is 
a system of psychology, comprehending the functions of the 
material organism, but drawing its resources from, and con- 
structing its philosophy by the aid of, every means of discov- 
ery which appertains to its subject. 

It is, moreover, a curious fact in the criticism which 
phrenology has encountered, that anatomists are commonly 
found either denying something which phrenology does not 
affirm, or else, very busy with the metaphysics of the sub- 
ject, or, perchance, enjoying themselves over some stupidity 
of phrenologists, who have wholly departed from the spirit 
of their science ; or, over some defect or error of its im- 
maturity, which does not impeach its general truth, any 
more than new discoveries in chemistry, which correct old 
theories, destroy its pretensions to legitimacy. 

In a majority of the anatomical objectors it will be ob- 
served, also, that they have adopted Jiostile notions of the 
brain's specialties of function, which they have built upon 
mutilations of living animals, and diseased manifestations, 
discovered post mortem. To which we need only reply 
that when nature is stretched upon the rack she may be ex- 
pected to make confessions and give testimony that are as 
false and unreliable as evidence wrenched by the old-time 
practice of jurisprudence from suspected criminals. It is 
utterly unphilosophical to depend upon the positive testi- 
mony of structure alone for the proof of function, and much 
more so to build a doctrine upon its mere negations. The 
brain has some testimony to give which is evidence, but it 
must be ruled by the laws of science in its application and 
effect. 

Practical Craniology has its own difficulties, and its pre- 

11 



242 METAPHYSICS. 

tensions must be limited in several directions, to make its 
facts reliable. The actual measurements must be verified 
incontestibly ; and after that, the effect of qualities of 
texture as well as of volume must be estimated ; and after 
that, the value of exercise or education must be weighed 
and embraced in the inferences derived. All of which, in 
their nicer shades at least, are not a little difficult of due 
appreciation. And when all this is achieved, there is a still 
more material and more difficult task for the man who will 
apply the science to the reading and rendering of the indi- 
vidual character — the Logical analysis of the phenomena 
and functions of the mind ! Who is fairly competent to this 
stupendous achievement ? In our own judgment, another 
Shakspeare is demanded to resolve and display the spiritual 
constitution of the soul, before any science of the organ- 
ism, however true in principle and in detail, can be perfected 
for use. 

For example — what is gratitude ? When some thinker 
fully endowed for the analysis of this feeling shall render 
it into its simples, the practical craniologist will be able to 
say of any man under examination, whether he has the 
virtue or not, and in what form, and to what effect. The 
accomplished phrenologist must indeed be the representative 
man of his race. He must have in himself all, and all vari- 
eties of, things which he looks for in others, else he will not 
find or know them. 

Nevertheless, the rudiments of human character may be 
rudely known, and have valuable uses and considerable cer- 
tainty in application. We have seen phrenologists go up 
and down through characters submitted to them, as if they 
carried a lighted candle in each hand, starting the secrets of 
the life from every hiding-place, till there remained nothing 
to wish for and nothing to doubt ; and, we have seen the 



METAPHYSICS 243 

same wonder-worker blunder shockingly incases where the" 
qualities of the man under examination lay outside of the con- 
sciousness and reach of the diviner. 

But these things are nothing to the purpose. The sci- 
ence rests upon its proper proofs, and is besides, maugre all 
its incapacities of every kind, verified sufficiently by obser- 
vation. 

As well as the circumstances allowed we have performed 
the duty to our readers which we undertook. We leave 
them now at the threshold of that system of mental philos- 
ophy which we regard as capable of all its promises, and of 
answering truly to every use that man has for a science of 
his own spiritual constitution. 



244 HABIT. 



HABIT. 

The word is in constant use, the phenomena intended by 
it are familiar to every one's experience, and it is subjected 
to examination and discussion, more or less formally, by the 
writers who methodically investigate the conduct of men, and 
the laws of human nature ; yet, the questions involved in 
the subject are by no means settled. In mere verbal defini- 
tions there is sufficient agreement : but Science has not yet 
afforded a logical definition of the term, or a philosophical 
explication of the law ; its facts and manifestations have 
not been analyzed to simplicity and exactitude ; their vari- 
ous kinds have not been classified according to their differ- 
ences, ends and causes ; nor has induction ascertained the 
most general law or fact in which all the particular species 
are contained. 

The authorities which have aimed most at definiteness of 
exposition have been most inaccurate ; and those that have 
best avoided false definitions have been most vague and 
unmeaning. 

In the first class is Reid, who defines Habit to be " a 
facility of doing a thing, acquired by having done it fre- 
quently f but, conscious of the error which, however, he can 
only confess, not correct, he adds, "this definition is suffi- 
cient for the habits of Art, but the habits that may be 
called principles of Action (meaning habits of the moral and 
instinctive faculties) must give more than a facility, they 
must give an inclination, an impulse to do the actions. v In 
this he is so far right. The notion of facility and impulsive- 
ness, as definitions of habit, are false in as many cases as 



HABIT. 245 

they are true, and for any of the services of system are 
totally useless. 

To avoid such contradictions, the other class of writers 
resort to words which mean nothing at all, or, at least, 
answer no want in the matter demanding explanation. 
Thus, Bostock says " Habit may be defined a peculiar state 
of the mind or body, induced by the frequent repetition of 
the same act." Webster — " a disposition or condition of the 
mind or body, acquired by custom 7 or the frequent repetition 
of the same act. 77 Dunglison copies Bostock, but like Reid 
feels the difficulties, and states them generally to the same 
effect, remarking that " the functions of the frame are vari- 
ously modified by this disposition — being at times greatly 
increased in energy and rapidity ; at others, largely dimin- 
ished. And the metaphysicians are as much embarrassed as 
the lexicographers and physiologists. They confess it : 
Reid says, " I do not believe that we will ever be able to 
assign the physical causes of either instinct or habit ; both 
seem to be parts of our original constitution ; their end and 
use are evident, but we can assign no cause except the will 
of the Creator." Dr. Chalmers speaks to the same effect 
of Dr. Thomas Brown's theory ; and the treatment of the 
question by the metaphysicians, generally, he characterizes 
as "an obscure and profitless speculation." 

The difficulties of definition and comprehension encoun- 
tered by systematic thinkers, are also betrayed by the pro- 
verbs which express the popular apprehension of the subject. 
One adage has it that "Practice makes perfect ;" but this 
is corrected, and, as a general proposition, contradicted, by 
another, which declares that while " habit strengthens (or 
perfects) reason, it Hunts feeling." And still a third, and 
different one, is in use to cover a broader operation of the 
law, to wit — " Habit is a second nature." Ir jfcsse maxims, 



246 HABIT. 

which embody the world's practical wisdom, the same variety 
of office and effect are recognized which confuses scientific 
speculation, viz. the power of Habit in training and develop- 
ing the intellectual and voluntary faculties of mind and 
body — its unlike action upon the understanding and some 
of the emotions and physical feelings — and its very notable 
power of altering the whole moral character and mental 
method and drift, while it leaves the intrinsic constitution 
of the man unchanged. 

For the ready use of the world's business these maxims 
amount to a tolerable practical philosophy of the law. But, 
if the common and uncultured philosophy of experience does, 
because it must, answer the most obvious and ordinary 
necessities of life, it is, nevertheless, to science, demonstra- 
tive, exact and symmetrical, that we look for the highest 
and best forms of truth. 

To indicate the defects of both the empirical and system- 
atic oracles concerning our subject, let us notice the several 
specific varieties apparent in the offices and effects of this 
great law of man's manifold life. "Without regarding rank 
in the order of presentment, such distinctions as the follow- 
ing are obvious : — Habit quickens and strengthens the five 
external senses. The practiced eye of the sailor discovers a 
distant sail, its nation, size, character and bearing in what 
to the landsman is a mere speck on the horizon. The savage, 
sharpened by the training of his forest-life, distinguishes 
sounds in the general stillness which are absolutely inaudible 
to the man brought up in the customary indifference to the 
noises of a crowded city. The same is true of the senses 
of taste and of smell, and eminently so of that of touch, as 
in the blind. But, on the other hand, habit has the directly 
reverse effect upon the sensibility to cold and heat, and the 



HABIT. 247 

rude contact of hard or hurtful bodies with the sensitive 
surfaces, whether of the skin or internal passages. 

It is familiar to every one's experience and observation 
how much exposure deadens sensibility to pain : the eye, 
while it grows ever more and more sensible and capable of 
those properties of external things which are embraced in 
the act of vision, by their repeated impression upon the 
visual nerve, at the same time becomes more insensible to 
the hurtful glare of heat and light by exposure to them. So 
the palate learns to bear the most acrid substances with in- 
difference, while the perception and appreciation of sapid 
qualities as regularly improves. The wine-bibber discerns 
the age and country of his favorite beverage by tasting 
only a few drops ; and the gourmand is a miracle of acute- 
ness in all the mysteries of cookery and catering. Here, a 
nerve almost callous to the fiery fierceness of alcohol and 
cayenne., coexists with another nerve capable of a delicacy 
of discernment which the water-drinking vegetarian can 
scarcely imagine or believe. 

Xothing, therefore, could be more inaccurate than the 
general statement that habit blunts sensation ; for while 
some sensations are so diminished in acuteness, others 
are as eminently sharpened. Xor is the notion a whit more 
correct when applied to the feelings of the soul than to 
those of the body. Habit does not blunt the feeling of 
love, pride, devotion or covetousness ; but quickens and 
strengthens them. And the same is true of all the affec- 
tions and instincts which, in general, we call feelings. 

Again : The pain of a.burn or blow abates steadily while 
it lingers, until it entirely subsides ; but hunger and thirst 
unsatisfied go on from mere uneasiness, through pain and 
agony, up to madness. In this case, neither the abatement 



248 HABIT. 

of sensibility nor the change of nature, affirmed by the 
common proverbs, have any place or power. 

Again : Love, devotion, compassion, grow in vigor with 
all regular exercise ; but grief, shame and remorse, as 
naturally exhaust themselves by their own indulgence. So, 
frequency and persistency of action are just as different in 
their effects upon the various faculties of the moral nature 
as upon the diverse physical organizations. Indeed, it is 
most probable that custom, or habit, or frequency of repe- 
tition, or persistency of causes and conditions (we are 
indifferent to mere verbal distinctions), varies in results and 
effects with all variety in the nature of the faculties con- 
cerned. 

But not only every different class of powers, and probably 
every separate power, is affected differently from every other, 
but each feeling and faculty is within itself capable of 
remarkable modifications by the agency for which we have 
but this one name. Thus, practice confers facility of move- 
ment upon the muscles of voluntary motion, as in the organs 
of speech and the fingers of an accomplished pianist, but 
without proportionate or considerable increase of their 
strength. On the other hand, the training of the porter, 
blacksmith and drayman, gives its increase in the kind 
exercised and demanded in their work — strength, massive 
force, and endurance, without facility or rapidity of move- 
ment. Again : both these modes of increase may combine, 
and the appropriate exercise will develop at once rapidity 
and robust energy in the same action, as in the stage dancer 
and the pugilist. 

A similar policy of this law is apparent in the working of 
the intellectual faculties. Readiness, dexterity, rapidity of 
thought and celerity of combination result from an adapted 



HABIT. 249 

method of exercise ; of which the clearest examples are in 
the powers employed in the arts of poetry and popular 
oratory, and in the several departments of the fine arts. In 
other combinations and uses the reasoning faculties gain 
massive force and robust endurance ; and, in yet other 
cases, this strength and that agility may be blended and 
cultivated by the appropriately mixed modes of mental 
action ; of which the higher styles of poetry, and eminent 
powers of forensic and parliamentary debate, furnish illus- 
trations. 

To the effect of custom here on the mind, as in the mus- 
cles and external senses, the notion of increased facility, or 
increased force, or both, applies sufficiently well for ordinary 
purposes ; but as a definition of habit to answer the ends 
of strict study, as we have already seen, it is not exact 
enough even where it suits best, and is totally fallacious as 
a general apprehension. 

But the capital failure of all the formal explications is in 
the fact that they make no account of the increased obe- 
dience of the intellectual and voluntary powers, and the 
increased resistance of the moral and instinctive faculties, 
to the will, under the strengthening influence of habit. It 
is, indeed, just here that Reid's hope of understanding the 
law breaks down, and it is just here, too, if anywhere, that 
a true philosophy becomes important to all the ends of 
knowledge, both for speculative and practical purposes. 

It is manifest that the voluntary powers — the muscles of 
locomotion, and the perceptive and reasoning faculties — be- 
come continually more obedient and more prompt in their 
service, as their activity and energy are augmented by fre- 
quent exercise •; while, on the contrary, the affections and 
instincts grow, at every stage of increase by indulgence, 
more and more ungovernable by the reason. Cowardice, 

11* 



250 HABIT. 

temper, and parental tenderness, for instance, may be culti- 
vated till they obtain the absolute mastery in their par- 
oxysms, though the victim be sane and fully conscious of his 
slavery. Here, the impulsiveness, the loss of liberty, result- 
ing from habitual action, claims due consideration, and is to 
be accounted for, if it can be ; but we look in vain for light 
to the teachings of physiologists, metaphysicians and moral- 
ists. The New Testament, in a hundred ways, teaches that 
sin is bondage, and the adage " Habit 4s a second nature" 
is capable of a similar rendering ; but systematic philosophy 
has not obtained any available hold of this great fact. It 
is not denied that writers and thinkers recognize, in some 
particular instances, the increased freedom of the free facul- 
ties, and the irresistible impulsiveness of the propensities 
of our nature, under the law of habit ; nor, that they un- 
derstand the stability of character induced by the force 
of custom ; but, it is none the less clear that they do. not 
know how to dispose of the facts which they encounter, or 
to provide for them in their systems, according to principles 
evident or demonstrable, and in such method as might render 
all the service of scientific truth. 

An attentive review of the specific differences among the 
phenomena resulting from this general law of habit, will 
show how inapt and incapable of its elucidation the Induc- 
tive or Baconian method of philosophy must prove. This 
system lays its foundation in instances and the facts of ex- 
perience, and thence proceeds from class to class, as from 
circle to circle of ascending generalizations, until the highest 
is reached at the central and supreme fact of the completed 
series ; the inductions, which are facts more general, resting 
upon and rising out of those more particular, till the pro- 
cess ends in the most general of all, which is the law sought 
for. Now, it is evident that this method of investigation 



HABIT. 251 

must be nonplused when it encounters incongruous and in- 
coherent classes of facts, which, while belonging to the same 
snbject, and occurring in like conditions, nevertheless, re- 
fuse to take arrangement in the same classification, but, on 
the contrary, stand out in contradiction to the inferences to 
which they should conform. The Inductive method cannot 
march and countermarch upon the same plane in its route 
to results. From effects it can infer efficient causes ; and 
from such causes it cbji again anticipate similar effects. But 
its province is limited strictly to the material world, where 
forces and phenomena are linked together by mechanical 
necessity ; and in dealing with its facts, reasoning cannot 
be too rigidly mathematical ; formatter is but an instru- 
ment and a slave, having all its references and uses above 
and beyond itself. But in the world of Mind, the govern- 
ment is not in a propelling force, but in a moral purpose. 
Its ends lie within the scope of its own being and destiny ; 
and Final Causes, therefore, shed upon its phenomena ^and 
laws the light in which they must be seen and rendered. 
Matter moves as it is pushed and impelled ; efficient causes 
are its laws, and the inductive philosophy its expositor. 
But mind stands addressed to its own destiny, reaching into 
its own future, and in the highest ends of its being must be 
sought the solution of its mysteries. 

Psychological facts, as facts, are to be treated under the 
same rules of observation and analysis as those of physics ; 
phenomena, whether they lie in the province of consciousness 
or perception, must be ascertained with * equal precision and 
by similar laws of evidence ; but, only; while yet within the 
proper sphere of experience are they amenable to its pro- 
cesses ; when they rise into the realm of life and mind, and 
their laws, that is, their governing purposes, are in question, 



252 HABIT. 

illustration can be found only in the ends to which they 
drift. 

Now the most general fact belonging to the effects of 
habit is not broad enough to cover the whole field, and 
therefore cannot take the rank of the law required. We 
notice that repetition or constancy of an action or impres- 
sion in some of the functions increases their facility, or 
strength, or aeuteness, according to the kind of exercise 
given ; but we are checked at the moment of deriving thence 
a law, or constructing a definition, by the contrary fact that 
similar repetitions, or continuity of actions and impressions, 
induce diminished facility, strength and aeuteness, in others. 
Here, then, the Baconian system, which looks for similar 
effects from similar causes, breaks down in the helplessness 
of its unfitness. Its sphere, which is limited to the appar- 
ent, is quite too narrow to afford a common centre for facts 
so eccentric, so little convergent, that they can meet only 
beyond the utmost boundary of nature, in the infinite of 
spirit, where the future must realize the thought of the 
Creator. * , 

It is worthy of remark that Bacon himself applied his 
method with great reserve and timidity to psychological 
investigations. It was but natural, indeed, that he should 
exaggerate the power of his wonderful discovery, and give 
to it a range something broader than its birthright ; but he 
felt, clearly enough to acknowledge, that in the sciences 
which relate to mind and morals, " it must be bounded by 
religion, else it will be subject to deceit and delusion." In 
our subject we think we have proof of incapacity of the 
material philosophy in the frequent confessions and general 
failure of those who have used its method ; and we make 
bold to affirm, too, that the history of modem metaphysics 



HABIT. 253 

» 

is one continuous record of similar catastrophes, and that 
all of them are fairly attributable to the same cause. 

Governed by the principles indicated, and chiefly with a 
view* to elucidate them, we will proceed to notice the 
most remarkable facts of habit and its most important 
uses. 

It is a law of life, universally. It obtains in the vegeta- 
ble world as well as in the animal and spiritual. It is a 
law of vital textures as well as of mental and moral facul- 
ties. It is the law of growth and development in all facul- 
ties whose education and enlargement are in the design of 
the being; and, subsidiary to this end, it is a law of protec- 
tion and defence for all those feelings and susceptibilities 
whose indefinite increase is incompatible with such design. 

Its forces and effects are graduated in the several spheres 
of its action, in proportion to the use and rank of the sub- 
ject. Upon vegetables it has an observable effect ; but it 
is much more conspicuous in animal organizations — still more 
in the' animal instincts ; and in the higher sentiments and 
intellectual powers of man it discovers its greatest energy ; 
thus, vegetables, within a comparatively narrow range, are 
capable of accommodation to strange climates : and, trees 
tapped for their juices yield the more abundantly the longer 
they are accustomed to the drain. Animals are more easily 
acclimated, and their organs take more readily and strongly 
the modes of action to which they are habituated ; the 
instincts and propensities, though equal at first to the ordi- 
nary wants of animals and men, are capable of very great 
enhancement ; and the moral and intellectual powers have 
quite indefinite capacities of enlargement, and of cletermin- 
ateness and strength of character and action. The relative 
value of the respective subjects determines their rate and 
proportion of increase under this law, and the End in view 



254 HABIT. 

demonstrates itself to be the law of the facts, and the true 
guide in their investigation. 

The powers which habit develops and enhances are those 
which enter as positive elements into the constitution of the 
being, and whose highest capacities must achieve his ulti- 
mate destiny. As the law appears in this class, it is facility 
and energy accumulated — acquired power become perma- 
nent— so much per centage added to the ever-growing prin- 
cipal by frequent re-investment ; like interest gained upon 
capital, and blended with it to yield interest in its turn — 
that is, power put at compound interest. As memory is the 
conservatory of acquired knowledge, so habit is the treas- 
ury of acquired power, and their gain and growth are the 
appointed means of all the changes for which conscious life 
is given, and in them lie all the possibilities of progress. 

The necessity of such laws of accumulation and expan- 
sion is obvious. . Indeed, if there were no such provision in 
nature, there could not be life in the creation, in any proper 
sense of the word. It is growth and progress only which 
really distinguish vitality from mechanism. 

Suppose a man or angel born or created at once in the 
maturity of his powers with no capacity for further unfold- 
ing — all progress forbidden, and the fnrthest limits of his 
nature reached in the first hour of his existence. With his 
end thus joined to his beginning, he could have nothing that 
constitutes a future, and could find no object for his contin- 
uance. Why should he abide ? Though a seraph in the 
measure of his soul, he is limited to an existence in which 
hope can have no place, in which perception and thought 
have reached their felt limit, and actual experience differs in 
nothing from mere exercise of memory. The past is not 
only behind but all around him, and the present is swallowed 
up in an eternal sameness. The heavens may keep time, 



HABIT. 255 

but his duration has no flow ; eternity rolls on, but for him 
there is no progress ; the highest aim of his being is 
accomplished, his nature's ultimate is attained — and why 
should his existence survive its object ? 

It is in the necessity of things that our birth and begin- 
ning shall be but a starting point of life ; and ready fur- 
nished, as we are, with faculties and defences which adapt 
us to our destiny, it is really no matter in what degree of 
ignorance and feebleness we start upon the endless career. 
The happiness and the harmonies of every stage are equal ; 
for fullness, which is happiness, has reference to capacity 
only, and not to degree or quantity. In the least favored 
state the. germ is given, the occasions of development are 
supplied, the law of increase is inwoven with the constitu- 
tion, and improvement unlimited is set before it ; and so, 
the relatively equal good, and the open possibilities, balance 
all inequality of states, and the equities of the universe are 
vindicated in the economy and history of every creature. 

But " Habit Hants feeling, ' J says the proverb. This is 
true only of certain sensibilities and particular affections of 
the sentiments, as we have already remarked ; and it is con- 
clusive in favor of our argument, that these are distinguished 
from those whose powers are exalted by repeated exercise, by 
no difference that can explain the apparent contradiction and 
confusion, except the respective differences of their ultimate 
use ; in other words, the phenomena are explicable by no 
philosophy, but that which rests in final causes, or, the 
intentions of the Creator. 

The organs of our bodies, which are the instruments by 
which the mind is exerted upon its objects, while they 
require the quickening and strengthening that constant 
growth can bestow for the accomplishment of their high 
purposes must needs be preserved from external injuries and 



256 HABIT. 

the irregular working of their own parts. To many hurtful * 
agencies and much abuse of their own offices they are ne- 
cessarily exposed. Prom these evils fatigue and pain are 
commissioned, by their reproofs and penalties, to protect us 
— a provision as beneficent and efficient as wisdom could 
devise without violating our free agency on the one hand, or 
abandoning us to destruction on the other. In fact, the 
human organism is not so adjusted to all its relations as to 
be absolutely secure from harm. Injuries and offences must 
come. Now suppose the organic sensitiveness, like the func- 
tions of the five senses, and the voluntary powers of the 
mind and body, to fee increased by exercise, and in propor- 
tion to its frequency and constancy. In such case, the 
necessary exposure to injuries would speedily exaggerate our 
capability of suffering till every feeling would sharpen into 
agony — every offensive smell, to the habituated sense, would 
become an intolerable stench — every touch a sting— and 
every ray of light, a burning flame. 

We must either be taken out of the world, or we must be 
protected in it. Habit, therefore, blunts sensibility to the 
pain of heat and cold and other hurtful agents, and that, in a 
manner and by a rule proportioned to the exigency as nicely 
as if an- ever-present intelligence conformed the law to the 
occasion. Within certain limits, whatever is unavoidable 
becomes endurable under the operation of this law, which so 
kindly covers the suffering sense with its protecting insensi- 
bility. 

In like manner those pains of mind and emotion, which at 
all events must be encountered in the regular order of 
human life, are guarded against'intolerable aggravation. In 
the degree in which they are disciplinary and beneficial they 
are permitted, but the blunting influence of habit is inter- 
posed to prevent the growth of a susceptibility w r hich, other 



HABIT. 251 

wise, would be unavoidable, and could only be injurious. 
The disappointments and bereavements of the natural 
affections, which in their first paroxysms threaten death or 
madness, in the healthy constitution decline continually 
while they linger, until the deepest anguish shades gradually 
into a tender melancholy that even borders upon pleasure. 
The grief subsides, but the love remains ; and the interests 
of life return again, and its duties revive their attractive- 
ness, and bring with them a happiness that, at first, would 
have felt like a mockery of the absorbing sorrow. So the 
mourner's tears are dried, and the natural accidents of life 
are stripped of their power to destroy through the sensibili- 
ties which they assault ; and the human heart is at once 
preserved true to its affections and capable of its duties. 
Our loves do not die, for their objects cannot perish. The 
heart's instincts assert the survivorship of all its treasures, 
and the grief which would contradict this hope is checked by 
a law 'written in our nature ; so that all the facts and feel- 
ings of our earthly experience intimate an eternal life, by 
. their happy adjustment to it and its necessary conditions ; 
and the Creator is thus pledged to the fulfillment of our 
highest hopes by the harmony of ends expectant upon given 
wants and means. 

The unlike and even opposite effects of training and exer- 
cise upon the intellect^ external senses, and motor powers of 
the frame, on the one hand, and upon the instincts and moral 
sentiments on the other, marked and distinguished by 
increased freedom in the former class, and increased impulsive- 
ness in the latter, which Reid despaired of understanding, 
seem capable of a useful though incomplete explanation even 
by the rules of reasoning proper to physical philosophy, but 
have no difficulty or mystery whatever under the system 
which takes ends and aims for its data. 



258 HABIT. 

The difference seems sufficiently accounted for by simply 
looking to the inherent difference in the nature Qf the 
respective subjects so diversely affected by the same kind of 
cause. The intellect, senses, and muscles of locomotion are 
constitutionally under the direction and control of the will ; 
they are voluntary powers in their nature ; and exercise, 
which has the office of increasing just those functions and 
qualities which it puts into action, and no others, must nec- 
essarily increase the freeness, which is an intrinsic quality of 
these functions, in exact proportion to the increase of their 
force . Strength becomes stronger, rapidity more rapid, and 
obedience more obedient, by the same rule. Every free 
faculty, as is w T ell known, becomes the more absolutely and 
promptly responsive to volition as it grows in energy and 
aptness. Exercise cannot change the nature or qualities of 
a power, because nothing can make itself into anything else. 
Culture can develop, and inactivity and abuse may abate a 
force, but cannot transform it in any element of its make, or 
give it a new quality or kind of action. 

The Arts are the product of the intellect directing, 
and the voluntary instruments performing, their commands. 
Thought, reasoning, perception, and reflection, are the pro- 
ducts of the understanding alone. Now, none of these 
have anything of impulsiveness, propensity, or desire, pro- 
perly so called, in their nature ; only the qualities which 
they have can be increased by their own exertion, and they 
cannot become impulsive, or involuntary, or ungovernable, 
by any possible enhancement ; for this would change their 
nature, which cannot be done, for another reason besides 
the incompetency of the cause in operation — a reason that 
lies back of it in the constitution of things. Creation 
determines the number, character and office of the faculty 
of every being, and allows no other modification in them or 



HABIT, 259 

in their actions than augmentation and diminution in degree ; 
preserving and maintaining them against all accidents, for- 
ever unchangeable in kind. 

But the instincts' and morals are marked by propensity, 
impulsiveness and involuntariness in their proper constitu- 
tion and character ; of which anger, love, covetousness, fear, 
and the appetites that minister to our animal wants, are 
obvious examples and proof. It is a good and useful 
description of these to call them propelling, while the intel- 
lectual are well described as the directing faculties of the 
mind. The latter, as we have said, having no mixture or 
quality of blind impulse in their nature, are only the more 
obedient for all their strength, original and acquired ; but 
the instincts and affections, given as the springs and im- 
pulses of a determinate constitution, when strengthened by 
training and indulgence become in due proportion more 
determinate, importunate and impulsive. Many of them 
were designed to act before reason is installed in its office, 
or .in its absence, as in idiocy, sleep and re very, and in 
emergencies, also, where it is inefficient and incapable. They 
are, therefore, in their very nature and intention independent, 
though capable of subjection, within certain limits, to the 
will. To this intrinsic independence of, and insubordination 
to, the directing faculties, given for necessary purposes, and 
regulated in harmony with the general aims of life, habit, 
by adding strength, adds its proportionate impulsiveness ; 
the impulse becomes a stronger impulse, the instinct more 
ungovernable, and the sentiment more stable and determi- 
nate. In all this, they are altered only in energy or force. 
Any change effected is only in the general conduct of the 
individual, and not in the nature of any particular power in 
him. The higher sentiments established in their proper 
authority, or, the lower passions and instincts usurping the 



260 HABIT. 

government, is the result ; but in all the general changes 
possible, the special faculties which effect them maintain 
their constancy of nature and function. 

A chemical analogy will illustrate this point, and show the 
method of the argument : oxygen combined with hydrogen 
produces water ; but with sulphur, it gives sulphuric acid 
or oil of vitriol. Here the modifying agent is one and the 
same, and the difference of the respective subjects of its 
action occasions the whole difference of results ; so habit 
exhibits as wide a contrast in its effects upon totally dis- 
similar powers. 

The intention in annexing the law of increase to the vari- 
ous feelings which determine our moral and religious nature, 
and so, riveting all the consequences of conduct upon them 
by virtue of a positive law, is as obvious and as admirable 
as the educability conferred upon the intellect and the 
voluntary muscles. These feelings are subjected, in like 
manner, to the influence of education and culture, that men 
may reap the fruits which they sow, and receive the exact 
reward of all their deeds — that they may become finally 
what they choose continually, and thus, make their perma- 
nent character by their own conduct. The instincts, pas- 
sions and sentiments are given in the variety and force 
which in the, whole species insure the means and possibilities 
of good, and their training and actual working are intrusted 
to every individual for himself, that the natural issues of his 
stewardship may attach in permanent consequences as 
reward and punishment, under this law of nicely adapted 
equities. Distributive justice keeps its records, has its 
judgment-day, and awards to every one according to his 
works by the standard of a prescribed law, and so adjusts 
the relations of its subjects among themselves ; but this 
law of habit executes its own decrees instantly upon the 



HABIT. 261 

act, and fixes every fact into the nature, and so, into the 
fate of every responsible being ; his deeds it records, not for 
or against him, in reserve for a trial day, but it inscribes 
them in him, so that his ultimate condition shall be at once 
the issue and the index of his life. 

That these most important endowments of our nature are 
capable of neglect and abuse, is a necessary result of that 
freedom which was conferred for very different ends. Some 
of them prompt us to provide beforehand against those in- 
juries which pain warns us of only after they are suffered. 
Fear impels us to avoid, and anger to resist, assaults ; 
parental love, to nurse and educate the young ; and vene- 
ration gives the necessary docility to the subjects of author- 
ity ; the possessory feeling prompts to industry, that 
benevolence may tax our acquisitions for the relief of the 
helpless and the needy ; self-esteem exhorts every man to 
conduct worthy of his position ; and even the love of ap- 
probation may check selfishness and lawlessness by the 
restraints of opinion ; faith and hope, with the sentiment of 
worship, put us into unity with the Divine ; and brotherly 
love and conscience establish the noblest relations with our 
kind. All these are active within us as by an instinct ; 
their movements are spontaneous, and they are capable of 
such strength of impulse as to determine the character of 
a human being beyond the risk of accident, caprice and 
choice, except as they work through the regular exercise 
of his powers. 

This law of habit, when enlisted on the side of virtue, 
strengthens and makes sure our resistance to temptation, 
and renders easy the most arduous performances of duty ; 
the struggles of the frequent conflict win at last for the 
moral hero the sway of a complete dominion. He who 
steadily repels the suggestions of avarice, licentiousness and 



262 . HABIT, 

revenge, will finally attain, not only a truce with these foes ; 
but will bring them as friends into prompt and helpful 
accordance with his better nature. Frequent achievements 
in moral conflicts in time pervade the whole character with 
their accumulating and abiding consequences. In the 
strength of an inwrought morality, its disciple and servant, 
by force of the double gain which every resolute effort 
brings to him, goes on, without limits, to still greater deeds 
and nobler sacrifices. This it is which is intended by the 
injunction " grow in grace." It is recognized in the terms 
" children, young men and fathers in Christ ;" and it is 
formally and explicitly stated by the Apostle to the 
Hebrews — " Strong meat belongeth to them that are of full 
age, who by reason of use have their senses exercised to 
discern between good and evil." 

The virtues thus gain their stability and assurance from 
the strength which exertion yields them, and the beauty of 
the provision is apparent. But the vices, also, by the same 
law, become the despots of the soul ! The origin of moral 
evil, its issues, and the reason for permitting it, we need not 
here attempt. It is enough for our purpose to remark that 
the fixedness of habit is not fastened upon either the virtues 
or vices proper ; but the law is inwrought with the 
powers whose actions are virtuous or vicious as they are 
exerted and directed — used or abused. Evils are not enti- 
ties ; no substance or faculty is bad ; and the laws of the 
universe are, like its Maker, always good. But abuses are 
evils ; these are only wrong uses ; and the growth and 
strength of good and evil in the life of moral beings is by 
force of one and the same necessity. Worship often 
repeated will energize the religious sentiment equally, 
whether it be directed to a stock, a star, or the true Deity. 
Exercise must strengthen the spirit and temper of the shed- 



HABIT. 263 

der of blood, as well as of the doer of good ; in a word, God 
created man, and gave Trim all his powers, and attached the 
just responsibility by making him the master of his own fate, 
that the endurance and the enjoyment, alike, might equita- 
bly follow upon the conduct of the agency intrusted. 

" Practice indeed makes perfect ; " "Habit, truly, is a 
second nature. " The world*s experience of the stability 
and determinateness of drift, which it gives to moral tenden- 
cies, and the certainty which it insures in conduct, is the 
basis of all confidence in character. Reputation is evidence 
in courts of law, as affording a safe presumption that a man 
did or did not do a particular act. It is an element in all 
calculations of policy, a philosophical basis of prophecy, and 
the ground of all that trust in the future for which we train 
the present. The principle is, that men will — must — live as 
they have learned ; that the law of life is continuity in char- 
acter with increase in activity ; that duration must add 
strength, and repetition give permanency ; that what men 
do they must become, as much as if God had made them so 
at first. 

A different constitution, one that would exempt us from 
the bondage which evil practices induce, would also unset- 
tle the security of our virtues. It is clear that that which 
is, is necessary, and also best. 

Some important consequences flow from this apprehen- 
sion of our subject. For instance — if the virtues thus grow 
by their own exercise, and in proportion to it, sudden 
changes of opinion and instantaneous conversions cannot 
give truth, and purity, and strength, like long practised 
righteousness ; and a man's deeds, and the habitude of his 
affections, rise into a high rank in comparison with the doc- 
trines of his creed. The law and the prophets are not sum- 
med up in one but in two tables of duties, and the second has 



264 HABIT. 

respect exclusively to every-day practical morality. He 
that would found his house upon a rock must be a " doer of 
the works." Let those who neglect their duties, and hang 
their hopes upon the cross of the dying thief, while they 
refuse their own, look to it. A death-bed repentance, and 
an after-death salvation, are, doubtless-, acceptable, and so 
is a plank when the ship with all its freight is sinking, yet, 
there is still some danger, notwithstanding all the divine 
mercies, that the kingdom of heaven, which the great 
Teacher, and all his first disciples preached, may not be a 
mere point in celestial geography, but really a great sys- 
tem of practical righteousness. If the laws of the kingdom 
were made for the government of this life, then " obedience, 
and not sacrifice " is required, and it will be totally vain to 
expect worship to sanctify wickedness, and to change our 
destiny without changing our real character through the 
agency of its constitutional laws. 

Again : If our views are correct, Education must be in 
fact, what it is etymologicaily — the drawing out of the 
powers — the putting them into action — educing their 
energies, and right direction of them. Moreover, the pro- 
cess and method of it must be alike in all the faculties of 
our nature, whether they be intellectual, moral or physical, 
for the reason, if for no other, that in all these kinds it is 
the employment of the organism as the instrument of every 
species of activity. How well St. Paul knew, and how 
forcibly he puts the impediment of the unsubdued and un- 
trained instruments of "the flesh" against the efforts of the 
"spirit" to obey "the law." The intellect may perceive, 
approve, determine, and endeavor, but the refractory organi- 
zation, and the insurgent passions can defeat all power of 
virtuous resolution. 

If we would know how to educate any power of mind or 



HABIT. 265 

heart, we may learn the whole secret in a gymnasium ; 
there, every nerve and muscle, whose force is to be made 
available, is trained and strengthened by its own faithful 
exertion ; every fibre is educated and > made promptly 
obedient by being vigorously employed and often com- 
manded. In like manner, the instincts, passions, and 
intellect are grown and governed, and not otherwise. If 
supernatural influences have any part in our mental and 
moral culture (which is as clear in principle as it is certain 
in experience), they act not without, nor contrary to, but 
through the natural laws of our constitution ; for our 
relations to, and dependence upon, the heavens were in con- 
templation at the creation, and so were regularly provided 
for in the structure and laws of the human spirit. 

As a rule of conduct, this theory of habit teaches that 
there is an absolute, terrible, physical necessity that the 
practice of evil shall grow, and at last confirm the tendency 
to evil — that, vice, which is but an abuse of our moral 
faculties, by indulgence becomes their only use, as though it 
were their nature — that, the propensities and blind animal 
instincts may grow into irresistibility — and, that, in the 
strictest truth, every immorality is pro tanto a forfeiture of 
moral liberty : — Habit is a second nature. We are, indeed, 
unconscious of the growth of our habits, as we are of 
the growth of our bodies. We do not feel that the minutes 
in their silent lapse move us forward toward our mortal 
term ; we observe not how a single meal increases our 
stature, or a siDgle effort swells the muscle which it exerts, 
but reflection, and observation, at distant intervals, confirm 
the facts. Could we but feel that our whole nature is under 
laws as certain as these, we would not trifle with our 
highest interests as we do. The robust consciousness of 
liberty delusively persuades us that we shall always have 

12 



266 HABIT. 

the government of ourselves, and that we shall be as free 
to choose our course after frequent departures from pro- 
priety as we feel while they are yet only in contemplation. 
We imagine that when we will, we can take our stand in 
unbroken strength of soul upon the furthest verge of irre- 
gular indulgence, and say to the torrent of our passions, 
" thus far shalt thou come and no further, and here shall 
thy proud waves be stayed." We forget that Sin is 
bondage, and that forgiveness itself can only remit pen- 
alties, while it leaves all the slavery of habit bound upon 
the faculties whose health and life are in their freedom. 

Some one may say, " but Paul was arrested upon the 
highway, and converted in an instant." Well, suppose his 
change an instantaneous one ; it is not in contradiction to 
our doctrine. His moral and religious faculties were neither 
feeble, untrained, nor unprincipled. The very earnestness 
and violence of his hostility to Christianity proved their 
strength and zeal in the service of the truth as he received 
it. " He verily thought within himself that he ought to do 
many things against the name of Jesus f and " In all good 
conscience he persecuted this way unto the death." - The 
religion which he opposed was in his apprehension a gross 
idolatry ; its leader had been crucified for blasphemy ; for 
the breach of the Sabbath ; for contempt of the priest- 
hood ; and for evil predictions against the temple and the 
ceremonial of worship of the true God. If Paul believed 
a lie he never loved its falsehood. His was mainly an error 
of opinion, and his conduct was rather mistake than crime. 
He was in a moment convinced of the truth : The "Naza- 
rene," whom he religiously abhorred, spoke to him from 
heaven, and the mind that saw nothing but the obstinacy 
of error in the martyrdom of Stephen, felt all the force of 
a divine warranty in the resurrection of the Lord. Quickly 



HABIT. 267 

as thought could compass the great argument all the 
energies of his noble soul enlisted in their new service with 
the vigor and devotion acquired by an honest practice in the 
hostile faith. He changed his banner, party, opinions, and 
their incidents, but he was new-born a man. The devotee 
of the old faith became a hero of the new — " straightway 
he preached the gospel in their synagogues." 

A bold, brave, true man belongs to the right, even when 
he is most zealous for the wrong, and is always in the spirit 
of the truth ; but no miracle could convert an unprincipled 
compromiser, a timid time-server, a fellow who consults the 
rascally doctrines of a selfish expediency for the direction 
of his conduct, a slave to party, a cheat, a coward. A 
respectable devil is cast out by a word of any disciple of the 
truth, but the shabby, driveling sort, the poor, " deaf and 
dumb ones go not out but by long fasting and much prayer." 

Reasoning by the rule which rises out of the purposes 
for which the creature is made, and inferring the destiny 
from the constitution of the being, our premises afford us 
the following among many noteworthy results : — 

Activity of all our powers to the extent of their capacity 
is enjoined by the fact of their bestowal. Liberty, accord- 
ing to law, is implied in their mere existence. 

They must be exerted in harmony with each other, and in 
due subordination of the lower to the higher ; and the 
relative rank of each is to be ascertained by the breadth of 
its range, and the value of its object. 

Nature has provided for the activities of life by the 
promptings of organic and mental uneasiness under pro- 
longed repose, and by the attractiveness of their several 
objects to the multiform powers aud capacities of our 
nature. Abuse is checked by pain and fatigue. 

But neither these promptings nor restraints are irresisti- 



268 HABIT. 

ble so early in the states which they were designed to 
remedy, nor are they so accurately adjusted in the force of 
urgency, as to secure perfect conformity to the supreme law 
of our life. 

The boundaries of choice thus fixed, by the spontaneous 
impulses on the one hand, and by the limitation of our 
powers on the other, may be narrowed or widened by the 
conduct of life ; and within this domain — the area of moral 
liberty — all our virtues and vices display themselves. 

The laws of mind and morals are to be sought for in the 
will and purpose of the Creator ; and these may be dis- 
covered both through reason and revelation. 

The facts of psychological science are experimental, and 
subject to the rules of the Inductive philosophy ; but its 
principles and method, rejecting Efficient causes of phe- 
nomena, rest upon, and answer to, Final causes or the 
ultimate ends of existence. 



POLITICO-ECONOMICAL. 



POLITICAL GOVERNMENT. 

Monarchy, Aristocracy, Democracy, are the principal 
forms of political government. 

In a Monarchy, government is exercised, laws are made 
and executed, by the authority and will of one individual. 
This form may be either elective or hereditary. Autocracy 
describes a monarchy in which the prince rules by himself 
without a ministry, council or advice. Originally, despot 
and tyrant meant only master and monarch ; but the abuse 
of power, so held, brought the words to imply cruel and 
oppressive governors or rulers. King primitively signified 
wise man, and the title was bestowed to designate the emi- 
nently wise man of the community. 

An Aristocracy is government by the nobles. It is 
also either hereditary or elective. The Feudal system had 
all the qualities of an Aristocracy. 

Monarchy and Aristocracy, in their various forms, and in 
various mixtures of them, claim to be the best modes of 
securing order in society ; and they base this pretension 
upon their greater efficiency, and the higher wisdom of their 
functionaries. 

Democracy is the special guardian of Liberty. A sim- 
ple Democracy is a government of the people by the direct- 



2T0 POLITICAL GOVERNMENT. 

est agencies. Representative Republicanism, while it re- 
spects the self-government of every individual as a leading 
principle, imposes more or less incapacity, and interposes, also, 
more embarrassments than the simplest and purest liberty 
would allow. The argument of inconvenience is alleged, 
and so, incompetency is managed without being offended, 
and the will of the people gets expression only in emergen- 
cies when, from some extraordinary cause, the community is 
aroused to assert it. Servants, to whom government is dele- 
gated, are under the same temptations to abuse the trust 
that masters are to whom it is surrendered ; but, as they 
are responsible, and elective at short periods, they must 
rely upon fraud, instead of force, to accomplish their ends. 

Democracy rests upon the innate right of all men to 
self-government. It is worthy of note that in New York, 
where suffrage is freest, only one-fifth of the population are 
qualified voters, and the Commonwealth is governed by a 
majority of these, or one-tenth of its people. In represen- 
tative democracies of the freest form the incapacities of non- 
age, sex, alienage, and imprisonment for crime, disqualify 
four-fifths of the people for the exercise of citizenship. 

All existing forms of government thus sacrifice or repress 
liberty to secure order. Absolutism, feudalism, republican- 
ism, alike, have their arguments for government by the wisest 
and the best. The difference in practical results is immense 
— as great as the difference between the one and the hun- 
dred or the million mass ; but still they agree in the princi- 
ple, that some natural rights must be surrendered in order 
to secure the rest. They differ in the extent, but not in the 
principle of their respective demands. 

Liberty and order have long been supposed incompatible : 
but they are not so ; else, men must either be slaves or 
demons, There is something, an element in each of the 



GOVERNMENT POLITICAL AND NATURAL. 2 ?1 

forms of government which we have enumerated, that is 
capable of agreement and harmony with something essential 
to each of the others. What each form affirms consistently 
with that which is affirmed by every other is true ; what 
they contradict in each other is false. Monarchy is unity 
of purpose exerted through a single exponent of the public 
will. This is true ; but, when monarchy denies individual 
liberty, it is false. So, popular freedom is true, but when it 
denies unity of purpose it is disorder. Hereditary Aris- 
tocracy is so far true as it affirms the physiological descent 
of high qualities from parent to child as a general law. It 
is false, when it claims government as an appanage of birth 
without respect to qualification. 

A true order would provide the government of the wisest 
and best on earth as in heaven, and so as to secure indi- 
vidual liberty, and guarantee the supply of the natural 
wants, and the highest culture to each and to all. 



GOVERNMENT— POLITICAL AND NATURAL. 

Democracy affirms that " the world is governed too 
much," and that " that is the best government which gov- 
erns least." If this principle is strong enough to carry all 
its consequences, it is then true that no government at all 
would be the perfection of political science. This doctrine, 
however, is checked up by that other general principle — 
government is necessary to the protection of the weak against 
the strong, and for the general good order and safety of 
society. To this end organic laws, called state constitutions, 
are formed, which protect the minority by tying up the 



212 GOVERNMENT — POLITICAL AND NATURAL. 

hands of the majority in the very teeth of the principle, that 
the right of government is in the greater number of voices. 

Here we have a pretty parcel of apparent contradictions ; 
to wit : The least governing is best, but the completed and 
consummated idea, no government at all, is absurd ! The 
majority has the right to rule, and is the only legitimate 
method of settling the right and wrong of any question 
which concerns civil life and conduct, but — constitutions 
must be adopted to secure the weak, the rights of the weak, 
against that right ! Can these things be reconciled ? 

We think that all these propositions are in their way true. 
Self-government is everywhere encroached upon by the politi- 
cal power ; everything ordained or forbidden by the munici- 
pal law is so much taken away from the freedom of the sub- 
ject. Consulting the individual's liberty only, the least 
governing is best, and none at all the best of all ; but this 
must be understood only of government by the majority of 
voices, which rules in the sole right of numbers, and enforces 
its will with pains and penalties. When men are utterly 
rid of that sort of government they will be better and hap- 
pier than they are ; but they must be better and happier 
before they can be rid of it. 

Government is indeed necessary to the protection of the 
weak, and constitutions are necessary in democracies to 
guard the rights of the minority ; but it does not follow that 
government and constitutions must be political and separated, 
as they now are, into a distinct function. The general 
organic action of society might be made to answer all the 
ends of life, and the office and use of political government 
might be fulfilled perfectly, by the regular and integral 
activities of such natural organization. The family, as 
nature institutes it, has no distinctive apparatus of political 
system in its economy. The parents levy no taxes — they 



GOVERNMENT — POLITICAL AND NATURAL. 273 

take all the children's labor. They reserve to themselves 
no separate aims and interests — they give all they have in 
return. Parents and children have each their individuality 
and all its incidents, but they are in effect a unit, a family. 
Conflicting rights are not jumbled into a paradox to afford 
protection to the weak ; the principles of the societary 
structure devote all the kinds of strength in the strongest 
to the service of the weak ; the elder serve the younger. 
The father charges no salary for his services to -the little 
community, and the mother runs up no milk bills against 
her babies. 

Here is one good government without a supplementary 
political apparatus. 

Cannot Democracy find some way of organizing the 
human family, which will really recognize the natural brother- 
hood ? Can it not find some method of action which will 
really protect the weak and nurse them too, and that with- 
out oontradicting one of its fundamental principles by anoth- 
er ? Now, that it has fairly overthrown the one-man power, 
we next need to have the despotism of majorities dethroned ; 
we need some better method of determining the right than 
by counting noses ; and some mode of making every man 
competent to every act of government which he must exer- 
cise in the general economy. 

Democracy will never be self-adjusted, nor self-justified, 
till it has organized institutions in which all its instincts are 
harmonized in a natural order. 

The compromise of "the greatest good of the greatest 
number," is as meagre and mean as the policy of the old 
time feudalisms. Every system of slavery in the world rests 
upon this pretence. It is purposely false in some of them ; 
it is in effect false in all systems which acknowledge it. It 
is the rights of all, the greatest good of all, which the 

12* 



214 GOVERNMENT, AN ACCIDEN 

world demands nt the hands of world menders and mana- 
gers. 

It is curious that the New Testament, which is the very 
gospel of liberty, gives no authority to the representative 
republican system. Is not this because the Great Reformer 
looked with impartial eye upon all political systems, allow- 
ing them all, preferring none, except as it is adapted to 
induce the permanent, the divine, order of actual brother- 
hood ? He could not sanction, fully, any system that allows 
any man to prey upon his fellow man. 



GOVERNMENT, AN ACCIDENT— OUGHT TO BE 
A SCIENCE. 

There must be a Science of Society. Men have a deter- 
minate nature. The structure of the human body is the 
same in the Egyptian Mummy . as in the latest born indi- 
vidual of the race. Every age has exhibited virtues and 
vices substantially the same. And the nations are only so 
many translations of humanity into different climates and 
conditions, all meaning the same things in different ways. 
It is clear that man is the creature of law, and that his 
freedom does not alter his constitution, however it affects 
his conduct ; and it follows, that the relations of men, which 
shape themselves into Societies and Governments, have also 
a fixed character, and are not to be invented, but only await 
discovery by human research. Man has not made himself, 
and he cannot, in any essential, change himself ; his inter- 
ests and happiness lie in conforming his institutions and con- 
duct to his nature, and so fulfilling the will of the Creator, 
instead of following his own caprices. 



OUGHT TO BE A SCIENCE. 215 

The duties men owe to each other, the rights which 
they have with respect to each other, must be matters of 
natural law and divine constitution ; and government can- 
not owe its origin to compact, or to any perception of the 
mutual advantages which it is capable of affording ; nor, 
can it be founded in experience of the evils of what is called 
u the state of nature." 

Writers have been accustomed to treat society as a con- 
ventional arrangement, and its policy as an expediency 
merely ; but this is manifestly absurd. Historically, it is 
false, and, philosophically, it is impossible. It is monstrous to 
imagine that God made every man without any reference to 
any other, and left him to form such relations as he could 
with his brother man, without providing for the harmonies 
of order in his constitutional instincts. It is false, because 
the so-called state of nature never existed anywhere. One 
or two idiots and misanthropists, in a generation, have lived 
alone ; but men are as naturally societary as the flocks of 
the air and the herds of the field. It is unphilosophical, 
because no such effects as human societies could exist with- 
out the special causes in the nature of man that are fitted to 
produce them ; and it is disastrous to human welfare to 
leave the relative rights and duties of men open to the 
quackery of experiment, deprived of the authority of the 
Governing Mind, and the homage and obedience due to the 
acknowledged will of the Creator. 

And sorely has the human family suffered, and grievously 
has it sinned, in this ignorance. Popular authors have taught, 
until they have made the opinion popular, that men, on 
entering into society, must surrender certain natural rights in 
order to secure themselves in the enjoyment of others. If 
this necessity were attributed to its true cause, and so under- 
stood, it would not be so bad ; but, laid down as philosophi- 



216 GOVERNMENT, AN ACCIDENT 

cal truth, it is eYery way pernicious. For the notion that 
we must give up some — an unlimited and indefinite number 
— of our rights, in order to enjoy the remainder, is all that 
despotism wants to stamp itself orthodox, and make it duty, 
patriotism, and religion to submit to its villainous exactions. 
The fool or rogue who invented that phrase may boast a 
success in mischief, that must put to the blush the pretensions 
of that other fool or rogue who tempted our Saviour in the 
wilderness with just such other oracles of moral and political 
policy. 

Concede to the governing class the surrender of any right 
as a price paid for the enjoyment of any other, and we have 
perpetrated a double folly — we have given up a right, and 
we have meanly purchased permission to enjoy another right ! 
That is, we have thrown away much, and reserved nothing 
in its sacredness ; we have put everything at hazard, and 
consented to hold our birthright by contract with some other 
pieces of just such clay as we ourselves are made of. The 
consequence is, that rulers have charged just what they 
pleased for taking care of those who were unwise enough to 
grant them the power for the sake of the favor. No form 
of slavery is intrinsically meaner, though some others may 
feel worse. 

It is certain that government must arise out of the human 
constitution, to be adapted to it — that its forms must answer 
to the nature of the subjects, and its ends to their wants, 
with exactness and truth ; and, it follows, that any particular 
form is false in principle to the extent that it is deficient and 
injurious in effects. This in its turn involves the necessity of 
a true philosophy of human nature ; for nothing less or other 
than a perfect system of mental and moral philosophy can be 
a true basis for the science of society. To adjust men to each 
other harmoniously, in all their relations, we must know all 



OUGHT TO BE AS CI EXCE. 271 

their nature, understand all their faculties, and respect all 
th£r rights, so ascertained. 

The wheels of a machine must be truly placed and related, 
or they will damage each other in the working, and in the 
same degree, disappoint the general end intended. It is not 
true that one must suffer a crush, and another lose a cog, in 
order that a third and a fourth may get room to swing out 
of their place, and a fifth to revolve slower in its appointed 
task than equal distribution of motion requires. On the 
contrary, all counter working is disastrous, and all friction is 
so much loss of power in the whole and in all the parts. It 
is the same in societies. Capacities ought to determine 
spheres and regulate functions, and the general system should 
find a place for all. The conceit that a sacrifice must be 
incurred at every turn, in order to square the movements of 
the whole, is no better than a confession that the machinery 
is not made fit to work upon the principles of its construction 
— in other words, that it is self-destructive. 

The system of political economy now in use has happened 
as a result of experiment, accident, conquest and compromise. 
Early errors produced permanent evils ; revolutions abated 
their sharpest and most obvious mischiefs, and altered their 
forms. Necessity taught some truths and philosophy re- 
vealed some others ; but monstrous grievances have always 
been tolerated, for the reason of their vested rights, or, the 
difficulty of overturning them. The notion that society is a 
matter of compact, and that policy is a system of compromise, 
has always been present to sanctify abuses and check radical 
reforms. The eternal right has been ever postponed to the 
conflicting claims of custom and possession. Government as 
it is. is only a cunning contexture of cobbled expediencies. 
There is not a government on the earth that knows whether 
it ought to educate its people or not, or, the reason for doing 



218 GOVERNMENT AN ACCIDENT. 

so, in any case where popular sentiment has induced some 
plan of elementary instruction in literature and science. -The 
true theory is not known, or it would be known how far such 
education should be carried ; and it would be done as early 
and determinedly as rivers aad harbors, and roads and forti- 
fications, are improved and constructed for public convenience. 
The men who insist most upon common schools, cannot answer 
why instruction should or should not be extended to all 
the arts, useful and ornamental, and to all professions and 
avocations, as well. as to letters and arithmetic. Just because 
the principle is not understood, its limitations in practice are 
not known, though its force is, in some blind, partial way, 
perceived. 

Again, no man can tell why, upon principle, Church and 
State should be separated ; and it is, therefore, not known 
why Sunday should be kept, or how, nor how and why it 
should be enforced. But, especially, no one can give a reason 
for separating religion from politics, nor the Church from 
the State, because, he cannot find any such separation and 
indepeDdence of religion and morality in the constitution of 
any individual man. And as the whole man is the subject 
of political government, and every act of duty involves its 
religious reason and obligation, as well as its sentiment of 
fraternal right, it is a curious jugglery of judgment that 
excludes from the government of the mass what must always 
exist in the conduct of each individual of that mass. 

Above all things, theorists tell us that society rose out of 
the savage state, in which every man is every other man's 
enemy, and lies in wait to take his property and life ; and 
yet, they construct their system on the principle of a perpetual 
antagonism, reduced from the confusion of chance and acci- 
dent, to the settled order of a regular competition. The 
whole scheme of our institutions and relations being nothing 



POLITICS — PRINCIPLE VS. PRACTICE. 219 

else than a warfare of interests, under an armistice which is 
to continue until one or other of the parties makes too much 
advantage of the rules given it to work by for its own 
interests ; and then the system allows a resort to first princi- 
ples again, or the employment of force, and revolutions are 
sanctioned by the very philosophy which upholds government! 
The prevailing compromise of Paganism and Christianity 
does not hesitate to teach the duty of obedience to the laws 
of the State, whatever conscience may say, and at the same 
time holds, that the people, or any part of the people, who 
are strong enough, may overturn the law-making power, at 
any expense of life and peace. A system that enjoins both 
obedience and rebellion, can have no pretence to a philoso- 
phical basis, or, to the character of a true thing. 

Societies, as they are constituted, allow a million, a thou- 
sand, a hundred men, to monopolize the entire soil of the 
country. They have no science of prevention, and they have 
no power of cure ; and poor-houses and prisons are witnesses 
of their impotency and of their barbarism. Civilization is 
'a compliment that all nations pay themselves. The Jews, 
the Romans, the Chinese, have plumed themselves upon it, 
and why not the European people ; and why should it mean 
more in our case than in theirs ? 



POLITICS— PRINCIPLE vs. PRACTICE. 

Tse establishment of the French Empire, with its almost 
autocratic Constitution, is of evil omen. It stands upon 
popular suffrage, indeed, and so far confesses the popular 
sovereignty in theory ; in effect it is a nullified abstraction • 
but even if the principle held its latent force for the proper 



280 POLITICS — PRINCIPLE VS. PRACTICE. 

occasions, it is ho more promising for future changes than 
the intrinsic instability of the French character. The first 
Napoleon and the Citizen King, Louis Philippe, as well as 
the present usurper, broke through the rule of legitimacy 
with impunity. The Dutch dynasty of England obtained 
the crown by election, in the revolution of 1688; and again, 
the Hanoverian succession was settled by Parliament, repre- 
senting the people, in IT 01. 

The catastrophe of Louis Napoleon's coronation is not at 
all relieved by the fact of his election to the throne. Mon- 
archy is but little concerned about the links in its chain of 
title, if only its conditions and powers are satisfactorily 
settled. The coup d'etat of December, 1851, was very cor- 
dially received by the despotisms of Europe; and the 
Empire is already formally acknowledged by all the King- 
doms and States concerned in the matter ; and nothing 
threatens disturbance to the present order, or promises 
advantages to popular liberty, in the immediate future, 
except conflicts of interest and ambition among the rulers 
themselves. The refugee republicans of 1848 are in the 
deepest despair. 

Nations, like individuals, feel oppression, and resist it, 
either in a passion, or with a purpose based upon principle, 
as may result from their character or from circumstances. 
Insurrections and rebellions are as natural as disobedience ; 
they are often nothing else. Communities are made up of 
individuals, and are just so much more of the same thing; 
and it depends upon intrinsic character whether a successful 
rising turns out a revolution or a row. 

Forms of government are questions of blood and creed, 
more than is commonly thought. Republican freedom and 
the spirit of Protestantism, or the right of self-government in 
civil affairs and of private judgment in religion, go together, 



POLITICS PRINCIPLE VS. PRACTICE. 281 

and illustrate the results of race and creed combined, both in 
the ancient world and in the modern. Infidel Greece, Rome, 
and France, and Protestant Britain and America, show a 
similar repugnance to the divine right of Hierarchy and 
Monarchy. The historic examples show that the religious 
institutions and the civil constitution of a people correspond 
closely. Blood and temperament are not so steady, though 
they give the law and control the destiny in the long run, 
however they may occasionally suffer a temporary suspension 
of influence. The people who appoint their Priests will elect 
their Governors. A Protestant Prince is but a symbol of 
sovereignty; the Executive Ministry must represent and obey 
the Commons. Ecclesiastical independence and supremacy 
consorts with political absolutism. Governments, sacred 
and secular, which do not ask the people's leave to be, on 
the one side — on the other, Rulers and Priests, mere minis- 
ters of the popular will. Thus, those nations who form their 
own religion, and those who acknowledge none, are politically 
free. Freedom in religion makes unbelief possible. Submis- 
sion to authority secures faith, and, tends to superstition and 
slavery in all its forms. Atheism and Fetichism are respect- 
ively the ultimate abuses of which the opposite principles are 
capable in religion ; in politics, they run out respectively into 
pure democracy and absolute despotism. 

There may be an absolutely best form of Government for 
all men, but it is, nevertheless, clear that special adaptation 
and present practicability decide the relative excellence of 
systems for the various kindreds of men. It is not a question 
whether freedom is best for every people, but, how freedom 
and order can best be balanced, where a people are less 
capable ; and harmonized, where tbey are fully fitted for 
democratic institutions. 

It is very certain that more than twenty centuries ago the 



282 POLITICS PRINCIPLE VS. PRACTICE. 

rights of man were well enough understood to get a fair 
recognition in the forms of civil government among highly 
cultured people. Some of the ancient States were very pure 
democracies. Among barbarous tribes, civil liberty, suffrage, 
and eligibility are almost universal. Fitness is right with 
them. Perhaps the masses are never anywhere without the 
knowledge of the first principles of political justice, or indif- 
ferent to the advantages of personal and civil freedom. If 
it can be said of our slaves, that they so far desire, as to be 
capable of, enfranchisement, the sentiment cannot be denied 
to any people under the sun. Mere selfishness and wilfulness 
are enough to inspire the wish, and a very little understand- 
ing is sufficient to underpin it with logical principles. 
Doubtless, the aspiration for liberty is instinctive in every 
human breast ; and among every people there is philosophy 
enough to digest the impulse into a system of doctrines. 

Democracy is, therefore, not a discovery so recent, or so 
local, that its happy realization among us must needs be* fol- 
lowed like a brilliant star just risen in the heaven of human 
hope. A few wise men of the East may come to worship 
where the young child is laid in its cradle, but the nations 
will pursue their favorite idolatries none the less. 

Psychological constitution, climate and other material 
conditions determine the social and civil institutions of men. 
Monarchy suits not with one kindred, democracy is ill-suited 
to another. These differences, with their intervening shades, 
are demonstrated by a sufficient experience, and they seem 
inevitable because they are constitutional ; but there is no 
ground in all this for despair ; oppression is not therefore 
the fixed fate of any people. 

Feudalism reigned over all central Europe during the mid- 
dle ages. It must have had some sort and degree of adap- 
tation to the people, and some correspondence to their neces- 



POLITICS PRINCIPLE VS. PRACTICE. 283 

sities and interests — even to the very lineage from which 
our own republicanism springs. Somehow our freedom grew 
up in that bondage ; and the fact that such slavery and 
such emancipation and freedom are true of the same stock 
of men, though separated by a long interval and many 
changes, suggests the possibility and the prospect of some 
harmonious mixture of these antagonist forms, which may 
combine their several adaptations, and give us an eventual 
higher form of civil polity than any yet known — the feudal 
order to adjust government to the varied capabilities of the 
subjects, the democratic principle of election or appointment, 
modified in some fashion, which shall secure the essential 
liberty of the subject, while the elective franchise is guarded 
against the abuse of incompetency. Such conciliation of 
liberty and order is certainly not impossible, for, if it were, 
the equities of civil rights and the obligations of civil duty 
must remain impracticable among men till the millenium — a 
doctrine not to be tolerated, because it justifies oppression, 
and makes the wrongs of the masses inevitable, and there- 
fore relatively just. 

Democracy, direct or representative, is possible and expe- 
dient in the most advanced societies, for its mature mem- 
bers ; bnt in a high civilization, with its vast interests and 
complex functions, about four-fifths of the population are 
excluded from the exercise of government by the legal dis- 
qualifications of sex, minority, and alienage. In iSTew York, 
where suffrage is nearly what is called universal, only one- 
fifth of the whole people are voters. In England, Wales, 
and Scotland, the number of registered voters in 1851 was 
but one in forty-one of the whole population (half a million 
out of twenty-one millions), and the votes actually polled in 
1852 were but one in sixty-seven. 

The abstract principle that, Governments derive their just 



284 POLITICS PRINCIPLE VS. PRACTICE. 

powers from . the consent of the governed, as yet, receives 
only a constructive, and not a practical or veritable, allow- 
ance in the freest Governments of the earth. It is obvious 
that representative democracy, as we have it, is not capable, 
even among ourselves, of a rigid realization. How much 
less so in southern Europe, the East Indies, and Africa ! 
Republican America has not yet discovered or employed the 
method by which every one of the governed may have an 
actual voice in his own government ; because, by our sys- 
tem, the suffrage in general elections also confers the power 
upon each voter of governing others as well as himself ; and 
for this, a safe amount of qualification is required, and the 
exclusion of the incompetent rendered expedient and neces- 
sary. 

Such a system always fails where the masses are ignorant 
and degraded, as in Mexico and France ; witness in the 
latter, seven millions of votes for the new Empire, and a 
half million of soldiers to enforce the people's will upon 
themselves ! 

The puzzle is, that the broad principle is true, but the con- 
forming fact quite impracticable in the circumstances where 
it is required ; and the mischief is, that the constant failures 
in endeavored realization cheat the revolutionists of their 
hope, and shake the faith of just men in the great truth 
which they worship. 

If I leave these points stand as an unresolved riddle, the 
facts of history are just as perplexing. The truths involved 
serve only for criticism. The principles which should serve 
for construction are to be discovered. Allow me to say now, 
that the communities of men, as they are in the earth, are 
capable of both liberty and order. My complaint is made 
only against the received science of civil society, and not a 
tithe of the objections are yet named. 



'physician, heal thyself. " 285 



"PHYSICIAN HEAL THYSELF." 

The essential nature of all races and classes of men is so 
far alike, and the resulting harmony of their interests so 
complete, that no difference of conditions among them are 
favorable f(5r any party, except such as relate them in help- 
ful correspondence to each other. All hostilities are mu- 
tually destructive. 

The laws of chemistry are laws of dead matter, and 
their work is death. An acid destroys an alkali, and is 
itself destroyed. Neither of the elements properly survives 
the conflict. The changes of mere matter are transforma- 
tions ; but in the domain of life, all reciprocal action is for 
growth and development ; its aim is perfection, and the law 
is harmony. Everywhere in living nature the individuals of 
a kind are at peace with each other ; and as the rank and 
endowments rise in dignity and excellence, social relations 
grow, with equal pace, more numerous, intimate, and benefi- 
cent. But the principle of liberty enters the system of exis- 
tence along with vitality, grows with its growth and strength- 
ens with its strength, and disorder and strife become possi- 
ble in correspondent augmentation. Still, the scheme of 
life is unity, and its policy is peace ; and the law of harmony 
must be obeyed, or it will be vindicated by its natural pen- 
alties — not that vengeance is the end, for the sovereign pur- 
pose is not more defeated by rebellion itself than by the 
punishments which correct it. Hell is a continued insurrec- 
tion, and annihilation would be utter failure and its com- 
pletest acknowledgment. Suffering is the corrective of evil, 
and the discipline of the wrong-doer, that, in the end, good 
may prevail ; or, as St. Paul has it, that God may be all in 
all, when all things shall be subdued unto Him. 



286 "physician, heal thyself. " 

To the working of this grand scheme it is obviously essen- 
tial that service and sacrifice be rendered by the higher to 
the lower ; that the elder shall serve the younger, the 
angels minister to the heirs of salvation, and the Divine 
atone for all. The great law of our life, the righteousness 
which is of God by faith, in the apostle's apprehension, is 
that the disciple "may know the fellowship of His suffer- 
ings, being made conformable to his death/ 7 and " fill up that 
which is behind of the afflictions of Christ." 

This doctrine of human redemption has been rendered 
vague and mystical by theological speculations; but it is 
based in nature and necessity, and must be understood 
before we can have the rule of duty, or guide of policy, for 
the aims of social benevolence. The idea is, that it is the 
office of the wise to instruct the ignorant, and of the strong 
to help the weak; for the fact is, that they can be enlight- 
ened and strengthened in no other way. It is this moral 
necessity that dedicates the good to the service of the evil; 
that sends the disciples out as sheep among wolves; that 
compels the surrender of life to the toils of study, to the 
sacrifices of the battle-field, and at the martyr's stake, and 
gives us all the forms of heroism which we worship among 
men. 

This being the economy, the policy, of the social system, 
what are its requirements, and the conditions of its success, 
in any enterprise of civil or political amendment of the 
condition of one class of men by the agency of another? 
If it be the system of domestic slavery, such as exists among 
us, which is to be remedied, it is clear that to be capable of 
the work, we must not cnly feel the wrong and design the 
relief, but we must know the means and possess or provide 
the conditions which shall avail in practice for the purpose. 

How does the case lie before us ? We are politically free 



"physician, heal thyself." 281 

as individuals, and independent as a nation. — The slaves are 
denied every civil and political right of human beings by our 
laws; they are chattels to their masters, and only sagacious 
animals to themselves. Are we qualified for their elevation, 
and are our institutions capable of receiving them into the 
freedom which we contemplate for them ? 

Legal emancipation might be effected in several ways. 
By legislation of the constitutional majorities, enforced by the 
peaceful powers of Government — by force of arms, employed 
by the free people of the nation in the compulsion of the 
masters — by successful servile insurrection — by colonization, 
and, by other means, or several of these combined. The 
relation of master and slave could be dissolved by either of 
these methods ; and, if the right of freedom were perfect, and 
the aim could certainly be well secured, the precedents which 
the world respects would warrant any of them, and they would 
be both allowable and obligatory upon the parties who pos- 
sess the power. But it is felt that there is something in sev- 
eral of these possible plans which forbids their adoption. 
Ko sound heart or clear head would consent to civil war, much 
less to servile insurrection, to effect the object. The reason- 
ing which justifies our own national revolution does not satisfy 
the conditions of this case. The abstract right is the same, 
in both white and black men, for, their ultimate destiny is 
the same, and the highest interests of each demand equally 
favorable institutions and order. Why, then, do we pause, 
both in thought and action ? 

I think the true reason is, that we are not fit, and that 
our civil and social economy are not adjusted to the necessi- 
ties of the enterprise. 

Our own liberties stand upon the principle that all men 
are created equal, and our institutions in theory recognize 
the right of self-government in every human being. We 



288 "physician, heal thyself. n 

provide for the impracticable exceptions, however, by our 
laws which exclude infancy and womanhood from participa- 
tion in the administration of the Government; and we run 
the risk of incompetency among adult white men, in the con- 
fidence that there is safety in the majority. For, after all, 
it is only a legal fiction that every man is his own governor, 
and assents to the laws which he must obey. 

Our American republicanism is, therefore, much narrower 
than the sweep of its theoretical maxims, and our institutions 
in no tolerable measure cover the ground of their basis; and, 
it is this very point of incompetency for the functions of 
government which breaks the correspondence. Still we hold 
by the principle none the less that we refuse its proper force 
in our forms and facts. 

Now, the principle is true. No man can own another man 
as property, and no man can own anything that belongs to 
that other man ; they are his benefits, and deprivation of the 
least is an injury and a wrong. But, general propositions 
need to be carefully examined and fully understood, or they 
lead to confusion. We say every man has naturally the right 
of self-government •* and our system in fact goes much further 
— it empowers every man to govern his neighbor also. In a 
particular exigency, a single vote may decide the policy of a 
whole State. Competency for political liberty in our repre- 
sentative system of legislation is, therefore, a matter in which 
everybody else is concerned, as well as the man who claims 
the right; and it is not unreasonable to make it a condition 
of enfranchisement and citizenship. But on the other side — 
the disfranchised man and woman may plead their natural 
right of self-government, infringed by the denial. Such rights 
as these in such conditions, may and do conflict. Where is 
the mischief that begets this confusion, and dislocates the 
logic of first principles ? 



"physician, heal thyself." 289 

These principles are respectively right, and cannot, there- 
fore, contradict each other. It must be an accident, it must 
be in the sphere of some falsehood where they meet, that they 
go thus to war. I can find the error nowhere else than in 
the constitution of the civil state. If that were true, if it 
were the true focal point of action for any right principle, it 
would not embarrass or destroy the force of any other. The 
primary rights of all men issue fairly out of the abstract 
truth, but they get entangled in the forms of our organic 
structure and the facts of our condition. It is not so in the 
institutions of nature. In the family economy, infancy and 
incompetency work no forfeiture of rights, and cripple no 
interests, and sacrifice no benefits, of individuals. Liberty 
and authority are there well balanced; parental instincts and 
natural affection promote the highest good of all. The wis- 
dom and strength of the little society supply its ignorance 
and weakness ; the inequality is without oppression, and the 
Government is in the best hands for the best uses of the whole 
community. The new-born child and the immature youth 
are governed so far as they need direction. They are not 
invested with offices of which they are incapable, but their 
powers are not crippled; their freedom is conceded to the 
full measure of their capabilities, and its exercise is encou- 
raged. 

Until the institutions of civil society are in like manner 
adjusted to capacities, and fitted for the protection of the 
interests of all its members, republics, as heretofore, will 
serve only for the greatest good of the greatest number 
which they can accommodate of the people concerned in 
organizing them. Government by representation in the 
higher counsels of State is said to be necessary, on account 
of the inconvenience of primary assemblies of the people for 
such purposes ; but ti has also another effect : it removes 

13 



290 "physician, heal thyself." 

the power by many a step in many an indirect path, from 
the populace ; and the majority principle in the election of 
legislators is nothing else than a plan for ascertaining truth 
by counting the noses of the opposing parties, however neces- 
sary it may be for the purpose of attaining a decision of the 
questions submitted. 

Now, with imperfections such as these which have been 
presented, and other violations of its fundamental principles 
which are obviously unavoidable, it is clear enough that our 
representative democracy is incapable of providing for the 
rights of all the people, and, at the same time securing the 
order civil and social, which exists among us. 

If we had a perfect order, no man would be any more dis- 
posed to hold a slave than to be one. A perfect system 
would be an adapted one, and of course, under it, no man's 
ignorance or weakness would be mischievous to any other, 
because provision would be made for him which would keep 
him in place, while his best interests would be kept within 
his reach, and so his own well-being would flow into and 
swell the tide of the general prosperity. 

I am not denying that republicanism is an advance upon 
monarchy and aristocracy, or that government of all by the 
many is an improvement upon the one-man power. I 
reckon, on the contrary, that our liberties are worth all that 
their purchase and conquest have cost in the past ages. 1 
am only exhibiting the discrepancy between the first prin- 
ciples which we hold, and the forms through which we 
endeavor to give them effect. The exposure shows the dif- 
ficulty which there is in according to the disfranchised classes 
the rights which first principles demand for them. The 
radical reasoner has no trouble in displaying his doctrine of 
human rights, and good conscience and highest policy cor- 
roborate his creed with their instant endorsement ; but the 



"physician, ueal thyself.'' 291 

objector who stands upon the incompatibility of universal 
justice with the existing system, has advantages in his posi- 
tion from which he is not so easily dislodged. 

When the emancipationist waives for the present the 
slave's political rights, and only insists upon his lawful owner- 
ship of himself, and his right to the rewards of his own 
labor, he concedes the alleged incapacity for full citizenship, 
and damages very materially the force of his argument for 
the simpler rights demanded. It greatly affects the entire- 
ness and beneficence, as well as the policy, of the individual's 
personal freedom, to strip him of its political safeguards and 
auxiliaries. This is what is meant by the assertion that the 
emancipated slave is changed into a nuisance, and crushed 
into the degradation of an oppressed caste, and held there 
without hope of change by the repugnance of the higher 
classes. I apprehend that there is no certain or immediate 
prospect that the free States will admit their colored inhabi- 
tants to the rank and rights of citizenship. If this be so, 
the objection, to this extent, is supported by the fact, and 
the incompetency of our institutions for complete emancipa- 
tion, affected as they are by the public sentiment which con- 
trols them, is established. 

But our industrial system, or the economy of property 
and commerce, and the social order which results, confront 
the proposed personal freedom of the three millions with 
other incompatibilities, which touch the very substance of 
our fitness to grant the right and to confer its real blessings 
along with the form and name of freedom. The Great Teach- 
er said to one of his disciples, " After thou art converted, 
preach my gospel ;" and we must not be surprised when the 
enemy retorts the advice to the friends of universal freedom. 

What, hitherto, have our laws done for the rights of labor, 
that may authorize us to reproach any form of oppression 



292 "physician, heal thyself." 

which touches the life of those who have no other capital ? 
Are they free from the faults which occasion the pauperism 
of Europe ? Are they not essentially a copy of the property 
feudalism which still survives in the Old World ? Nature 
and the necessities of our condition have made for us all our 
boasted difference. Imprisonment for debt, and the sweep- 
ing desolation of legal executions, are only now beginning 
to abate their barbarous rule among us. And the natural 
right of the landless man to his own patrimony in the public 
domain is still obstinately withheld ! ! We are still patch- 
ing up our systematic injustice with alms-house charities, 
and calling the necessity which this injustice creates Chris- 
tian beneficence. Our industrial system is still a cut- throat 
competition between labor and capital, and as much a war 
of classes as it was when the feudal baron was the task-mas- 
ter, and the hereditary earl was sheriff of the county. 
Abundance of land and the demand for labor of a pioneer 
epoch holds the mischief in check, but there is nothing in 
the nature and spirit of our industrial system which provides 
the conditions for general and effective emancipation of the 
enslaved, or fortifies our logic against his master. 

John C. Calhoun, about the year 1839, in a speech 
against the reception of abolition petitions, warned the gen- 
tlemen of the North who were then yielding to the enthu- 
siasm of their constituents, that there are other rights of 
property wholly artificial, and as much the creatures of mere 
positive law as the slaveholder's, which would come in time 
under the samecondemnation 4 He alluded to monopolies, 
private corporations, interest upon money, especially upon 
the debts of banks, circulated as money in the community, 
and titles to unlimited quantities of land, with other heir- 
looms of the old-time despotism, which will be brought to 
judgment when the principle of natural rights shall get 



"physician, heal thyself. " 293 

inaugurated in the government of the Union. He thought 
that the new patch on the old garment would tear out a 
large margin in the rotten fabric, under the strain of wear- 
ing ; and that the abolition gentlemen of property and 
standing would make the rent a great deal broader than they 
intended. I think they took the hint, and that the Balti- 
more platforms are well crammed with its prudence. 

The feebleness and fear of our defective system are only 
too strongly indicated by the stand-still conservatism which 
our magnates everywhere discover. The white free working- 
man is their real terror. Land reform, non-imprisonment for 
debt, homestead exemption, limitation of working hours, uni- 
versal suffrage, education of the people to their highest 
capacity, and democracy realized in all the interests of private 
life, are in the threatening programme of reform; and so, the 
appeal to conscience and absolute right in behalf of the chattel 
slave is branded as the rebellion of the higher law against 
social order ; and the fraternity«of nations, urging the natural 
sympathy of the republic for the freedom of Europe, is formally 
denounced in the creeds of the ruling parties. Precedent is 
resorted to for handcuffs upon progress, and the example of 
the fathers is paraded to show that mummies are the most 
stable forms of the human organism, and the very best models 
for a permanent order. 

To say nothing of the likelihood of advancing general 
liberty just now, what fitness for such work has that people 
acquired, who have enacted the outrages of the last ^eight 
years— the series which began with the admission of Texas, 
and was rounded up with the Fugitive Slave Law, and sealed 
with the finality resolutions ? Can a system whose elements 
may be worked into such results easily confer a capricious 
gratuity upon the victims of its habitual oppression 1 

I conclude that we are not fit, and that our institutions, in 



294 ASSOCIATION. 

their present form, are not capable of the proposed justice to 
the slave, and I predict that neither slavery in the States, 
nor its propagandism by the Federal authority, will sensibly 
abate till our democratic doctrines get a formal and positive 
application to the individual and private interests of the 
industrious classes. The multitude, which is the majority 
and the material force of our Government, must learn the 
common rights of humanity, and strike upon the method of 
asserting them effectually for themselves, before they will lend 
their power to the emancipation of the slaves or the repres- 
sion of the system of chattelism in man, and the degradation 
of labor which domestic slavery involves. 

1852. 



ASSOCIATION. 

We have but little acquaintance with the system of social 
and industrial organization which it proposes, but that little 
has made such impressions that we cannot doubt the good 
which will follow from the propagation of its doctrines. We 
are not of thQse who reject a theory because some of its most 
remarkable points seem impracticable, or because it rudely 
puts us upon the defence of our most cherished opinions. But 
there is a still stronger reason why we would not hastily 
reject revolutionary novelties — the feeling which we have in 
common with everybody else, that the system of things in 
which we live is not so good that it ought to be blindly 
defended against all change. Stubborn conservatives ought 
not to forget that their opposition to all proposed reforms 
really involves them in responsibility for all the evils which' 
they passively maintain. The people of this generation are 
terribly worried with revolutions and reforms, but they would 



ASSOCIATION. 295 

not be at peace if philanthropy, real and pretended were to 
desert the earth to-day. The world is not good enough, nor 
well enough ordered to ensure comfort and quiet, if all its 
fanatics were dead. It must be mended, and this felt 
necessity will ensure every plausible reform a hearing from 
somebody, and those who accept it will press its claims, 
whether men will bear or whether th>ey will forbear. 

On every side our understanding is challenged to inquire 
and our hearts are courted to act on the vital interests of 
humanity. All our institutions, religious, civil and economi- 
cal, are undergoing the boldest and most earnest investiga- 
tion. Some minds are occupied with questioning particular 
points in the established order. Of these there are so many 
sets, each pressing a special reform or a single idea, that our 
whole inheritance of usages and opinions, creeds and conven- 
tionalisms are attacked in detail; and there are others that 
with a universal sweep, strike boldly at the entire system of 
society, and put us at once upon the defence of creed and party, 
'position and property. In the hurly-burly of this general 
war there are doubtless errors and excesses committed by all 
parties; as well by conservatists as by the most radical 
revolutionists. 

In the great strife we may, if we will, remain comparatively 
inactive, but we cannot be indifferent. We do not evade the 
questions presented* nor escape their effect upon ourselves, 
by merely declining the open championship of the opinions 
which we hold. Indeed the refusal to investigate and dis- 
cuss, only puts us more quietly, but not less positively, into 
the defence of things as they are, for if I reject all the reforms 
which solicit my aid, I am supporting the institutions which 
exist, and the powers that be, as decidedly as if I were doing 
battle for them in the open field of public controversy. We 
think there are but few reflecting people who would volun- 



296 CAPITAL V5. LABOR. 

tarily make themselves answerable for the whole sytsem of 
things as they are. Utopia can't be made so drunk and 
crazy and wretched as the world we live in, and the prophets 
and philosophers who propose a new heaven and a new earth 
meet our wants and necessities so nearly that they ought 
neither to be mobbed nor scorned. If men could be wise and 
honest and happy, as we are, they might turn up their noses 
at all innovation, but they are not now exactly in the cir- 
cumstances to be saucy to any fool or madman that has a 
higher hope and a more equitable system. 

We have a world to put in order, and why not receive 
proposals and examine the terms of all the world menders 
who wish to take the contract ? Some of them have excellent 
suggestions to make, and among them all, a good plan 
may be found. 



CAPITAL vs. LABOR. 

"Under this head the Pennsylvania™ of yesterday quotes a 
speech delivered by a Mr. Butler at Lowell, upon the threat, 
ened or expected reduction of the operatives' wages, accom- 
panied with its own comments upon the speech, and opinions 
upon the topic. The facts appealed to are matters of the 
highest concern, and the views advanced as interesting, and 
true, too, as a partial and partisan investigation can well be, 
It is to be regretted, however, that the drift of the discussion 
is so deeply tinged with party politics. > Capital is of no 
particular creed, religion, or party, but has its own instincts, 
and naturally pursues its own interests. Differences of 
sentiment modify the character, and within certain limits, 
affect the conduct of particular capitalists, but the system 
and its necessities control them in essentials, and level all 



CAPITAL VS. LABOR. 2 9t 

other distinctions in effecting their classification. Demo- 
crats as well as Whigs hold bank stocks and own factories ; 
and the law of their order generally determines their rela- 
tion to labor, and governs their behavior towards it. The 
principles of Democracy, indeed, would righteously regulate 
and harmonize the respective interests of the employer and 
the workman ; but, in fact, the mere profession of these prin- 
ciples does not induce conformity in the capitalists of either 
party, nor secure the rights of the persons in their employ- 
ment. 

Moreover, money is not voluntarily guilty of all the oppres- 
sions which it inflicts, and labor is not wholly innocent of 
its own wrongs. 

The accidental embarrassments which wealth suffers, and 
its own disturbing antagonisms, take away much of its free- 
dom and moral responsibility ; and the ruinous competition 
among workmen themselves, and their unequal strife with 
machinery, still further influence their condition, and confuse 
the question. Just as long as labor must sell itself for 
wages, in the open market, it must accept the market price, 
though life, liberty and happiness are thus converted into 
commodities. 

The principle which lies at the bottom of the whole mat- 
ter is overlooked in all class legislation and partisan reason- 
ing. Justice and humanity plead for the rights of the opera- 
tive ; avarice and order advocate the interests of the 
employers — both alike maintain the existing war between 
them ; and the result is that the victory always falls to the 
side of the most powerful. In the language of the good 
book — " on the side of the oppressor there is power." But, 
whatever benevolence demands, men cannot be made better 
on the one side, nor wiser and stronger on the other, than 
their respective circumstances will allow. 

13* 



298 CAPITAL VS. LABOR. 

They must be otherwise adjusted to each other before the 
evil can be remedied. Mutual hostilities cannot result in 
anything but mutual injuries. They must be harmonized. 
The capitalist must be made secure of equitable returns — 
the laborer, of all that he produces, and they must both be 
interested to do each other justice before they will ever be 
so disposed. 

Labor is the efficient producer of values — wealth is an 
indispensable instrument. Labor is the creator ; wealth is 
a necessary condition of its productiveness. They must be 
adjusted — married to each other, that their legitimate fruit 
may be mutually and rightfully enjoyed. Nothing that is 
bought and paid for can be free. Labor must be taken 
into partnership with capital before it can receive the issue 
of its own energies. The whole system is incoherent and 
unnatural. 

Wealth is the product of labor in its largest meaning ; 
nothing that human labor creates is indestructible — what- 
ever hands produce perishes either in the using or by neces- 
sary decay ; yet money, the mere representative of industrial 
products, by the necromancy of legislation, is made immor- 
tal. If by any effort or accident I get money enough to 
maintain myself for twenty years without labor, I can, by 
lending it at five per cent, interest, make it last unimpaired 
my lifetime, and the lifetime of one representative heir in 
each generation through all time to come ; and so discharge 
one man for ever from the necessity of labor, and cast his 
support upon the industry of others. The things, sub- 
stances, products of labor, for which it was at frst exchanged, 
all perished, perhaps within the first twenty years of that 
endless term ; but the bonds and stocks endure eternally. 
The bush in the mount which burned without being con- 
sumed was nothing to this. The miracle of perpetual inter- 



CAPITAL VS. LABOR. 209 

est npon capital eclipses it as much as Vesuvius surpasses a 
farthing candle. 

The British debt has been paid, fully paid, again and 
again. That it never can be paid under the present system 
of perpetual interest, which leaves the capital undiminished, 
proves the falseness of the principle— that which is impossi- 
ble is not according to nature and law. The money of the 
world is owned by a few. The very gold originally given 
for the values exchanged has worn out, but the paper and 
parchment assurances suffer no change, and the labor of the 
world is taxed to maintain the amount undiminished. But 
all this is not the fault, the crime, nor the shame of the 
capitalist ; but of the system which enforces his submission 
and oppresses him, also, in his degree, as sadly as the poor- 
est dependent in his employment. The rich man's gains are 
as insecure, and he dies in as great apprehension for the 
well being of his children, as the poorest. The beggar has 
nothing to leave to his children — the millionaire can only 
provide for his, by entailing his wealth upon the third gene- 
ration, and he does not feel safe when he does that. If 
labor and wealth, hands and purse, were but well reconciled 
and harmonized, the mutual insurance would protect and 
bless both with peace and plenty. " Seek first the kingdom 
of heaven, and all these necessary things shall be added unto 
you f contains the philosophy of the divine order, and indi- 
cates the only conditions upon which its blessings can bo 
secured. The societary family must be organized, the 
actual brotherhood of man must be established, if we are 
ever to be relieved from anxious thought for to-morrow, and 
delivered fram the pressure of want to-day. 

The cry of the " poor against the rich," is often translated 
into the cry of " bread or blood ; and the stubborn conser- 
vatism of wealth must expect at last to meet its victims at 



300 CAPITAL AND LABOR, 

the barricades. We will have no hand in provoking and 
prosecuting such unnatural war among brethren, and we 
will preach no gospel to the poor that does not work by love 
and purify the social system. We would urge reform, 
because men must choose between that and revolution. 
Throwing the restraints of the civil law and established order 
into the current may dam it for awhile, but the accumulated 
tides will at last break the barrier, to find the channel again, 
and will then overflow the banks in its desolating rage. 
Gradual reform or violent revolution is the necessity of our 
condition. 

There are some men who depend upon their crutches for 
their progress, and hug their chains as their only security. 
Nothing is so fearful to an essential slave as freedom. They 
need not tremble at the threatened change. Their system 
will necessarily last for them as long as they live. The his- 
tory of humanity might reconcile them to the necessity of 
change of some kind. The annals of the world's progress are 
but so many tomb-stones of its departed kingdoms, societies, 
and systems. We must go forward — we are embarked upon 
the tide, and if the head reels and the shores recede and sink, 
it is because we are drifting toward our destiny. Better 
bravely trim our sails to the breeze, than cowardly to depend 
upon anchors which cannot hold. 



CAPITAL AND LABOR, 

There is nothing in the spontaneous action of the social 
economy to limit the accumulation of wealth in single hands, 
and municipal law nowhere interposes to say thus far shall 



CAPITAL AND LABOR. 301 

individual appropriation go and no further ; nor, on the other 
hand, does the constitution of society or civil law make any 
provisk n, other than poor laws and voluntary charities, to 
prevent absolute destitution. The distribution of wealth is 
left to unregulated individual competition. The natural ten- 
dency, and the actual operation of this system, are to increase 
all existing inequality of distribution until it ultimates in the 
very extremes of pauperism and of opulence. All the causes 
which are primarily concerned in breaking the balance con- 
tinue to act, and with a force multiplied at every stage by its 
own effect, so that every new result is an increased departure 
from proportion and equality. 

Capital does not, in nature and fact, reproduce capital, for 
" money is barren," and all commodities perish in the using. 
Capital and labor co-operating have the function of reproduc- 
tion, — separated, they are both alike incapable. In the 
present order of things they are divorced, or, rather, they are 
unmarried ; they hold no true relation to each other, and 
their issue is not legitimate. Capital purchases, and by pur- 
chasing, dishonors labor, and at the same time corrupts itself. 
Their union is necessary to their fruit fulness ; but labor is 
denied any natural right in the issue, and accepts wages 
instead. This is the principle of the mis-alliance, and the 
degradation corresponds to the wrong. Labor is honorable 
in union with capital, and its wedlock unclefiled ; but its 
prostitution is not relieved by either custom or necessity. 
The labor that sells itself every day in the market would not 
be so much flattered if it were really respected. 

Under our system of hostile ownership, the soil, materials, 
and implements are under the dominion of one party and 
interest, and wherever the system has become considerably 
matured, the other party is at its mercy, and must accept 
such conditions as it has to offer. Against political and 



302 CAPITAL AND LABOR. 

religious despotisms, revolutions and rebellions are often suc- 
cessful ; but against the money power, never. The law of 
property, established in the world's conscience, and strong 
in every man's instincts, sanctions the mischief, and protects 
the abuse, while it supports the right that lies under them. 
Men cannot do what they know to be wrong in principle and 
inconsistent also with the tacit agreement of the social organ- 
ization. The evil is in the system. It is an organized 
warfare. Man is armed against his fellow man, and life 
itself depends upon the struggle, and compels it. The laborer 
exhibits his sufferings and makes his complaints ; the capi- 
talist answers by showing his own necessities, and so justifies 
•his monopolizing acquisitions. In impulse and purpose both 
are right ; in method both are wrong, and equally anxious, 
uncertain and unhappy. 

The method only is wrong, for exclusive property and 
differences of taste and necessities are just and natural. 
But nature is consistent with herself, and no man's interest is 
in another man's loss, by her constitution. The parties must 
be reconciled in action as they really are one in interest. 
The brotherhood of the race stands translated into partnership 
in business. Instead of buying and selling, hating and rob- 
bing, each other, give each his equitably adjusted benefit in 
the mutual product of combined means, skill and toil ; inau- 
gurate justice, conform the system of life to the truth of 
things ; and we shall have reciprocity of feeling and mutual 
guarantees out of our harmonized interests, and all the ben- 
fits and blessings of a true commonwealth, industrial and 
social, as well as political, will result. 

It may be difficult, but it cannot be impossible, to organize 
society naturally. In truth, there is nothing so practicable 
as the right. Human experience proves that all false systems 
fail ; sound philosophy insures the success of the true. To 



THE OLD fiRUDGE. 303 

call the hope of better things visionary, is in effect to preach 
content with the existing falsehood and evil, and virtually to 
defend and support them. 



THE OLD GRUDGE. 

The war between wealth and poverty cannot be compro- 
mised, for there is nothing in the demands of either that the 
other can afford to grant, and nothing in their respective 
wants which can be surrendered. Poverty needs all and 
more than wealth possesses; and gives no pledge that it 
would use it any better or be any better satisfied than the 
present holders. Wealth has as hard a fight against pros- 
pective as poverty has with present want. Never a million- 
aire dies but he endeavors to entail his property, that is, 
encumber it to his immediate heirs for the security of those 
most remote from him, which the law allows him to provide 
•for. Wealth has terrible fears which compel it constantly to 
increase, and anxiously to secure, its possessions — poverty 
has pains which goad it to continual assaults upon the cruel 
inequality of distribution by which it suffers. 

The conflict of these belligerents has not the formal array 
of the battle-field, for it is not fought across any fixed party 
line. It is a promiscuous hand-to-hand struggle. Every 
man strikes the man next him, employing at once all the 
stratagems which can deceive, and all the force that may 
crush, his victim, having no other cause of quarrel than the 
spoils of victory. There can be no end of a war which gives 
no combination to the combatants, and makes every conquest 
a cause of strife among the victors. It is a free promiscuous 
fight in which every man's hand is against every other man, 
and every other man's hand against him. 



304 THE OLD GRUDGE. 

The picture cannot be overdrawn. "The battle of life !" 
It has become a proverb; and men have submitted to it as 
to a necessity. They have even digested it into a philosophy 
and given it a shelter in their religion. Either as penance 
and atonement, or as discipline and means of growth, the 
sufferings, privations and disabilities of the strife are com- 
mended to the acceptance of men. 

A false philosophy teaches us to ascribe our virtues to our 
wants, our achievements to our necessities, and quotes his- 
tory and distorts logic, to prove the paradox. Such doc- 
trine, if it proves anything, proves the Millenium an impossi- 
bility, and reduces heaven to a dream. According to it^ 
some kind or degree of hell is an essential condition of human 
existence. While it insists upon the growth of change from 
evil to good, it denies that from good to better, and from 
less to more. 

Whence came the idea that activity must be extorted by 
suffering ? not in the music saloon, the picture gallery, the 
ball room, the library, the social circle, the church, nor from 
any place or thing we call a joy. — The slaveries and curses 
of life are so much in the foreground that they hide its 
blessings and beauties from observation. 

Men must be reconciled with each other, and with nature, 
or they cannnot be in harmony with their Creator and their 
destiny. Society must be reorganized — conflict must give 
place to confidence, strife to unity, and competition must be 
swallowed up in brotherhood. It is sin to preach submission 
until there is peace. 



CLUB HOUSES. 305 

INDUSTRIAL COMPETITION. 

Free industrial competition is, in principle, a system of 
masked fratricide. What it calls a fair chance is the dance 
of a rough-shod donkey among chickens, with a free fling of 
his heels at the crippled and haltered nags that occupy the 
adjoining stalls. That liberty which dissolves society into 
separate individualism, and turns everybody into the melee 
of a deadly antagonism is, in effect, the political system 
of the savage state mixed with the social and industrial 
economy of civilization. Landlordism and monopoly of 
wealth, severed from the old feudal ownership of the 
laborer, in the end converts those who were once serfs, 
through the process of emancipation and wages slavery, into 
public paupers, but not until the free toilers have first con- 
verted the wilderness into a garden, and covered the land 
with palaces, and delivered its mines into the hands of its 
masters, and then they get leave to perish in their poverty. 

So far as the tendency of the system goes, it is a refine- 
ment in cruelty for wealth to claim credit for emancipating 
the body and bones of a man while it keeps its clutches tight 
upon all the labor they can yield, and at the same time 
keeps itself discumbered of the carcass. He that buys the 
use of a man, buys the man himself and should take care of 
him — accordingly, a poorhouse support is felt to be the fag 
end of the wages bargain between wealth and labor. 



CLUB HOUSES. 

Club Houses and Unitary Buildings for united families are 
being considered and will doubtless soon come into fashion. 



306 CLUB HOUSES. 

If they were confined to the use of people in moderate or in 
merely independent circumstances, the argument for them 
would be irresistible. At present nothing short of an im- 
mense fortune can secure all desirable conveniences, and afford 
all necessary defences to the separate household. In our 
cities, among the poorer of our respectable buildings, the very 
same cooking and slopping are carried on in all the adjoining 
rooms throughout a whole court, row, alley, or street. The 
common walls are thinner than good partitions ought to be; 
and if a child cries in its bed, half a dozen neighboring house- 
holds must lie awake to listen to it. The front door is in the 
street, and the back door opens upon the nuisances of the 
whole range ; cleanliness and privacy are impossible, and the 
proportion of expense borne by each establishment over what 
it would be in well regulated associations, is the difference 
between hiring a sorry cab for fifty cents and riding in a 
handsome omnibus for sixpence. 

Society still retains so much of the savage spirit of isola- 
tion that families will slink into a cell or kennel in dismal 
distrust and defiance, rather than club their means, and live 
together in palaces, the way the households of princes do. 

The unitary building, by putting whole families on the same 
floor, covering in the common stairway, and supplying heat 
and light, and cooking and washing, on the principles of a part- 
nership, would secure all the economies of large capital well 
managed for the benefit of the smallest stockholder. It would 
spare to every family the necessity of at least one servant ; 
it would easily provide a library and reading-room out of the 
joint stock in books and papers of the whole establishment ; 
it could keep open an agreeable resort for the leisure hours 
of all the inmates, and supply the instructive method of 
neighbourly intimacy. The rate of rent would be regulated 
by the level of the floor occupied, so that a fifth story 



PROTECTIVE UNIONS GUAKANTEEISM. 307 

would be as cheap as a hut two miles up town, and be at the 
same time so contrived that the family need never descend 
except when in other circumstances^they wished to go down 
street. 

But we cannot pretend to enumerate all the benefits of the 
scheme, and we see none of its inconveniences. The unitary 
building must not be judged by any supposed resemblance to 
one of our horrid barracks of dwelling-houses, crowded with 
ten or a dozen families tumbled in as if they had been dumped 
down out of a cart into the rooms. We are speaking of a 
palace cheap enough for the poor, and grand enough for the 
rich, because large enough for a variety of both. 



PROTECTIVE UNIONS— GUARANTEEISM. 

These associative movements are attracting general atten- 
tion, and are in several places in successful operation. Yery 
recently we have one started in this city, which numbered 
one hundred and ten persons within a fortnight of its first 
effort. 

The objects are generally stated to be protection and 
co-operation in the prosecution of such branches of mechani- 
cal and mercantile pursuits as may be found necessary and 
expedient for the mutual benefit of the membership. Pro- 
vision for the relief of sick and disabled members and the 
defraying of funeral expenses, is also made. 

The economy of the association is somewhat complex, as 
it must be (however well devised), to embrace and arrange 
all the functions which it is to fulfil. 

An initiation fee is required, for the purpose of securing a 
capital for the business of the society. 



308 PROTECTIVE UNIONS — GUARANTEEISM. 

The candidate for membership must be at least twenty-one 
years of age, " and of a moral character/ 7 and is admitted to 
membership by an unanimous vote. 

Members are to have stated and proportioned benefits of 
the association in sickness, &c, on their farther compliance 
with certain terms and conditions, and making certain stated 
contributions to the fund provided for that purpose. 

A contingent fund also is raised by a tax of five cents a 
month upon all the members, to be applied in charitable relief 
of sickness and misfortune of the membership. 

The business of the society will embrace the purchase and 
sale of such commodities, goods, wares and merchandise, a3 
are required by the ordinary necessities of life, i. e. it will 
keep a store where the products of its members' industry will 
be taken at the ordinary market prices, and sold again at the 
usual profit. The capital will be invested in the variety 
necessary to such general trade. The members are required 
to sustain the Union by the patronage of such employments 
and business as it may he engaged in. 

Xo portion of the funds or property of the Union shall be 
loaned. All operations of the Union shall be for cash. 
Each member shall have the privilege of purchasing for the 
use of himself and family and shall be allowed upon his pur- 
chases five per cent., which he may withdraw at the end of 
the year. Members may purchase at wholesale, and the 
discount shall then be made at the time of the purchase. 
The branches of trade prosecuted by the Union shall be 
determined by the Union in session. Traffic in intoxicating 
liquors and tobacco, excluded. At the expiration of five 
years that portion of the profits which may have accumulated 
upon sales to the public, and the property on hands, will be 
divided among the members, in the ratio of their respective 
purchases. 



PROTECTIVE UNIONS GUAR ANTE EISM. 309 

This is a hasty, very hasty, and imperfect account of the 
organization, obtained by a glance at the Constitution, with- 
out leisure for examination, or explanations, from those who 
are most interested in, and best acquainted with it. 

The main object is to effect the exchange and purchase of 
necessaries, and save to the consumer the profits usually paid 
to the exchanger, in the form of 5 per cent, on the amount 
purchased at the end of the year, and an equitable dividend 
of the resulting profits at the end of five years. Incidental 
advantages will be derived by the management of the concern 
to the mechanic who may find steady employment and fair 
wages for his work from the Union. The "beneficial" feature 
added, makes it a health assurance also, and the contingent 
fund is a provision of benevolence. 

It is difficult to reason from first principles upon schemes 
which are not broad enough for all the purposes of society, 
and yet are so far complicated as to embrace a considerable 
number of its functions and interests. The general policy 
of guaranteeism has demonstrated its efficiency in a great 
number of single interests ; but those enterprises which 
include productive industry and exchanges together, are as 
yet matters of experiment ; and integral association, which 
first principles alone would safely and certainly direct, has 
never been fairly attempted. Communism has had repeated 
trials, and frequently attained and enjoyed such success as it 
aimed at for considerable periods, but it never was self-sus- 
tained, and *t never can sustain itself. The coarsest and 
lowest necessities of life may be secured on the lowest level 
of our common nature, but provision for the development of 
the whole man and the growth of the race, must respect the 
individualism that corresponds to the natural differences of 
men. 

We are not offering any opinion or venturing any predic- 



310 PROTECTIVE UNIONS G U A R A N T E E I S M. 

tion upon the principles and prospects of Protective Unions. 
It would be rash as unavailing to do so. Every thing new 
must be learned, which is as true for the experimenter as 
for the thinker. 

If there were or could be enough people engaged to sup- 
ply the whole variety of uses on which we all depend for our 
daily wants ; and if the exchanges of service, and products 
of skill, capital and industry, were effected so as to prevent 
speculation and antagonism of the money power, we could 
answer in a word for the success of the scheme. But to a 
partial and incomplete one, there attaches the difficulty of 
guarding it against the power of all that is necessary to it 
but not within its control, nor linked into its harmonies. 
This, however, is only a difficulty, and there is wisdom and 
virtue enough somewhere to meet it 

The world is busy all around us in the preparatory studies 
and experiments of which this is an example. Guaranteeism 
is the marked character of the era. Odd Fellows, Sons cf 
Temperance, Beneficial Societies, and other voluntary asso- 
ciations with practical ends in view, under a hundred names 
and forms, and embracing, perhaps, a million of our country- 
men, indicate the transition from hostile and indifferent indi- 
vidualism to the societary organization which the nature 
and necessities of man demands and predicts. 

People are beginning to understand that it is association 
which builds magnificent churches for the parish which can- 
not afford a single fine dwelling-house for any one of Us 
members — that by accidental association of the community 
a man can ride twenty miles an hour in a floating palace for 
a shilling — that by the contribution of a trifling sum, securi- 
ty against want in sickness can be had, or a little fortune 
laid up for the family, bereaved of its support by death ; 
and men, however slow to understand their own experiences 



PROGRESS OF THE AGE. oil 

and learn their largest applications, will at last employ them 
for the most beneficent, and the grandest purposes — -just as 
the long neglected power of steam has been elaborated into 
omnipotence, and the simple phenomena of galvanism are 
made to answer the purposes of omnipresence. 

It was necessary — it is orderly — that the physical triumph 
should be first achieved, and then the social becomes possi- 
ble, obvious and necessary. From the isolated savage to 
the associated man there lies a long infancy of error, suffer- 
ing and resulting education. The world has some hard les- 
sons to learn yet, but it is very busy just now with its stu- 
dies, and will at last reach the Q. E. D. of the great pro- 
blem of human existence. 
i84a 



The Progress of the Age, in its material aspect, as well 
as in its intellectual and moral, rightly interpreted, means 
association, neighborhood, brotherhood, unity — Distance is 
the enemy to be overcome. 

The American Railway Guide reports that on the 1st of 
January, 1853, there were in the United States, 13,221 
miles of completed railroad ; 12,928 miles of railroad In pro- 
gress of construction ; and about 7,000 miles under survey, 
which will be built within the next three or four years — 
making a total of 33,155 miles ; which at the average cost 
of $30,000 (a well ascertained average) for each mile, 
including equipments, etc., will have consumed a capital of 
$994,650,000 ; in round numbers, one thousand millions of 
dollars. 

Add to this the canals and navigable streams in the 
nation, and the telegraph lines, of which we had 16,729 



312 PROGRESS OF THE AGE. 

miles in December, 1852, and the post-routes traversed in 
the year to the extent of fifty-nine millions of miles, and we 
have some idea of the apparatus provided for the intercourse 
of the people of the Republic. Twenty-five millions of peo- 
ple have invested at least fifteen hundred millions in the 
ways, and perhaps five hundred millions more in the means 
or vehicles, of inter-communication — eighty dollars a head 
invested by the people in the routes of travel and transpor- 
tation (railroads, canals, turnpikes, plank roads, and river 
improvements). One hundred millions is the interest of two 
billions, at five per cent. ; and if the stock is worth par in 
the average, one hundred millions is the expense of travel 
and transportation to the good people of the Union. Nine 
millions more is the cost of the General Post Office, and 
four dollars and a half is the apportioned expense of each 
individual, for all the advantages of intercourse in all these 
ways secured to us. One hundred and ten millions per 
annum, the aggregate cost of our war with space. 

By some of these routes, Time is almost annihilated ; by 
others, he compromises for about five hundred miles a day ; 
while on others, he still holds us at the old jog trot inconve- 
nience. But materialism is everywhere giving way, and the 
sovereignty of mind is rapidly getting itself absolutely estab- 
lished. The hostile forces of geography hold but little against 
us, except its mountain fortifications ; but ere long it will 
be driven from these, also, and have no real resting-place 
but in the atlas. It will always make a show in maps, but 
in the fact it will amount to nothing. 

Time and space are nothing to disembodied spirits. When 
we have disembodied them, our own bodies will be less 
troublesome, and much more convenient for our use. Bishop 
Berkeley denied the existence of matter ; but even those 
who, by his philosophy were able to overcome their preju- 



CALIFORNIA GOLD FEVER. 313 

dices, were none the better able to get over the distances 
which it interposed. The German metaphysicians think that 
time and space are mere forms of the understanding. Well, 
no matter about the logic that undertook so to dispose of 
the matter ; we are hopefully busy working out the fact, 
which will answer our purposes something better. 



CALIFORNIA GOLD FEYER— LUXURY— ASSO- 
CIATION. 

There are at least twenty vessels at New York, getting 
ready to sail for California. New Orleans is as much 
excited and as active in the enterprise, and the same may 
be said of every city and perhaps every village in the coun- 
try, each in its degree. It is plain enough that the business 
of colonizing will go bravely on, and the gold country will 
be crowded with adventurers as quickly as travel and trans- 
portation can possibly effect it. Will the workers of those 
mines, and the laborers who furnish their, supplies, permit 
themselves to be under-worked by slaves? Will not the 
colorophobia of the adventurers, itself, begin to work for the 
cause of freedom ? And will not the emigrants carry with 
them enough of sense and principle to take care of them- 
selves in this respect ? It seems to us that there is a clear 
streak of light breaking out on the coast of the Pacific. 
What a glorious recognition of the right it will prove, if 
all our acquisitions in Mexico turn out at last as so much 
advancement of truth and freedom. 

The gold and silver of the whole earth, emptied out into 
our lap at once, need not work to our injury. Give us free 
men — free principles — -justice, honesty, and equality — give 

14 



314 CALIFORNIA GOLD FEVER. 

us a tolerable approach to human brotherhood, and the lux- 
uries of the East and the wealth of the West will do no 
harm. The upward tending soul of man will know how to 
find the hidden blessing that there is in abundance. Gold 
is a good metal, and it will be all the more useful as it grows 
more abundant. Real freedom need fear no evil in the free 
abundance of anything the Creator has made. God has 
not hidden away in the bosom of the generous earth any 
stores of essential evil for the destruction of the human race. 
The fruits of its bosom, for whose abundance we annually 
send up our thanksgivings, are as liable to conversion into 
instruments of destruction, as are the minerals beneath its 
surface. The love of gain in merchandise is just as corrupt- 
ing as the rage of gold digging — and scarcely as generous. 
Evils are not things, but abuses ; and the religion that is 
limited to charity for man, without any faith in him or hope 
for him, is essentially defective. It is just as dangerous to 
set a slave legally free as it is for a white man to come of 
age and assume the government of his own life. It is as 
dangerous to live in a city as it is to own a gold mine. 
Freedom in every degree, and of every kind, is full of dan- 
ger, but slavery of every degree and kind is death. Sin is 
bondage, and bondage is sin. Liberty only is life. 

Luxury is abused indeed, but never more so than when it 
is evil spoken of, and never so much misunderstood as when it 
is feared. Why, health is luxury. Ease and happiness are 
internal luxury, and depend upon that which is external. 
And poverty, with all its pains, is an essential curse, how- 
ever it may be subdued or controlled for good, and however 
its direct results are evaded and avoided. Ireland is starving 
poor; is that a blessing? The majority of men must labor 
with their hands during all their waking hours to keep the 
animal alive ; is that a blessing? And nearly everybody is 



CALIFORNIA GOLD FEVER. 315 

a slave for the means of subsistence, and dies in terror of his 
children's destitution ; is that a blessing ? Is it shocking to 
see whole communities crazed with the greed of gold ? then 
turn to the sober, settled insanity of our plodding business 
marts, and see how general the appetite, and learn how strong 
the necessity ; and learn, also, to recognize in all these forms 
of the feeling, a natural impulse. Examine its laws, its ten- 
dencies, and adjust the order of society to it ; for it can be 
balanced and made at once beautiful, beneficent and har- 
monious. 

Special, extraordinary and extravagant manifestations of 
the desire for wealth, excite attention, and its misfortunes are 
recorded against it and reasoned from and feared as if these 
exhibitions were the evil of money loving and money getting. 
This is a view at once partial and false. The avarice that 
spreads itself over a whole life is not so favorably distin- 
guished from that which explodes upon a particular enter- 
prise. Xor is either the one or the other just such an 
unmitigated sin as moralists imagine. The world's crime is 
not in its necessities or in their activity; and opinion will 
make nothing by rebuking the pursuit of wealth, until the 
order and institutions of society enable the world to obey 
the injunction, "take no thought for to-morrow, what ye 
shall eat and what ye shall drink, and wherewithal ye may 
be clothed." Except within the institutions of the true 
church and under the shelter of its economy, this is com- 
pletely impossible. 

Organize the Church of Christ first, then preach its prin- 
ciples and policy to the world from the practical position 
which makes its laws practicable. The man who loves his 
wife and children must take thought for their to-moiTOw. But 
give us institutions which shall relieve the fear and supply 
the want — give us the brotherhood of the race — give us its 



316 CALIFORNIA GOLD FEVER. 

family arrangements, its mutual dependencies, harmonized 
by its mutual interests ; let all its wants be supplied by that 
which each member ministers to the whole, and in that inte- 
gral, natural and necessary order, the impulse to acquire will 
be kindly, social, holy, as the industry of the human mother 
or the mother bird to supply her young. It is not the love 
of wealth but the strife of wealth — the battle kept up by 
hostile individualism of property, which wastes the bounties 
of heaven and perverts them, both in pursuit and possession, 
into a curse. 

In the meantime we ought to deal kindly with the crimes 
and follies which we virtually compel. 

It is reported that those rough, greedy men, who are 
digging and gathering gold in California, do not rob each 
other or quarrel over their gains. They have abundance 
within their easy reach ; they leave their uncounted and 
unmeasured ore in their huts, undefended, day and night, and 
no one takes it. The natural sense of right, relieved from 
the pressure of necessity, and from the feeling of inequitable 
distribution, is enough to guard the treasures honestly 
acquired, without the aid of law, society, or the presence of 
womanhood, and the refining conditions which we have in 
more orderly communities. The men are free — utterly free 
— the gold is free, and each man's acquisitions are measured 
by his industry and strength ; and natural conscience rules 
with its natural force and justice, because its decisions are 
unembarrassed by artificial rules. 

Even among such men, in such circumstances, all the 
interests and all the functions employed in that mean and 
partial association are marked with justice and harmony. 
But let some lordling bring in his bond slaves to work for 
him, and we will not answer for what is called the peace of 
society and the rights of property — nor for the lives of the 



REDEMPTION. 317 

innocent victims of oppression, either. They, like established 
societies, may expend their vengeance upon the wretches 
whom others compel to inflict their wrongs. 

Oh, how much there is in that prayer, " thy kingdom come ; 
thy will be done on earth." If our metaphysical religion 
were but fully translated into actual facts, and put into 
practicable forms, we would have, every day, our daily 
bread, without fighting or begging for it. 

January, 1848. 



REDEMPTION. 

Our brother's crimes are our diseases- — 
His sufferings are our sin. 

In the local item column of our newspapers we have an 
almost daily report of casualties and crimes, which bitterly 
reproach the social organization in which they can occur. 
Thefts and suicides by men, compelled by want, — profligacy 
and self-destruction of women, to escape the evils which they 
can no longer sustain ! All the offences committed against 
self and society are not chargeable to the mere wantonness 
of the will. The world's wealth is not equitably distributed 
by the system of property and the constitution of society. 
In Europe there are millions who are, of necessity, trespass- 
ers upon every foot of appropriated soil, and nuisances in 
the highway! We have essentially tjie same industrial and 
property institutions. The difference in our political eco- 
nomy, and the vast difference in the quantity and price of 
land, make all the distinction which we can rightfully claim. 
The helpless poor in our cities, who cannot avail themselves 
of these advantages, are in the same pauperism that curses 
Europe. 



318 REDEMPTION. 

Alms-giving is the remedy relied upon there, and the same 
form of benevolence is the remedy here. In neither is it 
adequate. It is unavoidable, indeed, and as suitable as 
patching an outworn garment is, until it can be replaced by 
a better one. Misery, present and pressing, must be relieved, 
though the means only aggravate the mischief. 

If the Kingdom of Heaven, which the gospel promises, 
could any way be established upon earth, all these necessary 
things, for which so many toil all their lives, and so many 
perish for the want of, would be happily provided for all. 
The Creator and the material creation are not in fault. The 
heavens and the earth are genial and generous; but human 
society is a terrible failure. Its order and economy are 
essentially vicious. Living costs everybody too much; some, 
more than they can pay. The three learned professions, 
embracing a large share of the learning and talent of the 
community, are all the time at work cobbling and tinkering 
the sins and sufferings of society, without much success. 
Governments are quite as busy trying to hold the incoherent 
mischiefs of the social and political systems in merely tolerable 
order. Nations consider each other natural enemies. Chris 
tendom at large disowns the brotherhood of the race; and the 
average of religious conscience is not above the municipal law. 
So, we have faith without works, and religion and morality are 
practically divorced. Scarcely anything of all that heaven 
and earth tenders for our use answers its purposes except 
sleep ; millions are denied the blessings of that, and to nearly 
all, the excellent uses of life are postponed till after death. 

Fortunate people secure the means of good at a sad expense 
to the unfortunate, whether they know and intend it or not 
— like the rank grass that grows upon graves, the rich riot 
upon the wretchedness that rots beneath them. Bad people 
find gratification in such luck as this, strive for it and glory 



REDEMPTION. 319 

in it. Good people cull some happiness out of their cares, 
while suffering for the present, and laboring and praying for 
the " be.tter time coming." But the average of human his- 
tory is a mournful story, punctuated all along with tomb- 
stones, and embellished only with the monuments of those 
who have died to atone for the sins of the world. 

These deaths, however, mean something that more than 
compensates for the melancholy which they awaken. The 
Cross of the Sacrificed is the mystic symbol of the world's 
eventual redemption. Every martyr ascends to the Father 
to receive good gifts for men ; every life loyally devoted and 
generously offered up, swells the treasures laid up in heaven 
for the world. The children of the slayers become the heirs 
of the slain. The victims which their fathers slew become 
sacrifices to them : the slaughters of each generation are the 
sacraments of its successor, till humanity shall be regenerated 
in the blood of its own innocents, the wide earth become 
one great altar, and the promised new heaven and new earth 
' are established in consummated righteousness. 

This must be the divine philosophy of that Providence 
which sends its chosen ones out into the world like sheep 
among wolves, and makes its angels servants unto the heirs 
of salvation. The world must work out its own redemption 
through the divinity of labor and the sacredness of suffering. 
" This cup may not pass " till " it is finished," but the last 
expiatory cry of suffering love that darkens the heavens 
and shakes the earth, will herald in the resurrection and the 
life, and the long procession of cross-bearing disciples who 
have followed Him in the regeneration, shall end in the rnil- 
lenial triumph. 



320 BENEVOLENCE, ETC. 

BENEVOLENCE— SIN AND SUFFERING— CIR- 
CUMSTANCES. 

At a meeting held in the Commissioner's Hall, on the 27th 
inst., resolutions were adopted, and a society organized for 
the establishment of a Dispensary in the District. Mr. 
William J. Mullen was elected President for the ensuing 
year. Dr. James Bryan and Dr. Matthew F. Groves, Vice 
Presidents. Henry S. Godshall, Secretary. Samuel M'Me- 
nomy, Treasurer, and thirteen gentlemen of the District, 
Managers. 

From the resolutions published and from other sources, 
we learn that during the prevalence of the ship-fever last 
year, eight hundred persons were sent to the alms-house 
from that District, and that the District expenses incurred 
for burying the dead amounted to six hundred dollars a 
month. 

It is said that the first case of cholera in the city (1832) 
occurred in Moyamensing, and that it has been a generator 
of typhus-fever, and other contagious and infectious dis- 
eases, for years. The poverty, wretchedness and impurity 
of some portion of that region get expressive manifestation 
in its pestilences. The causes are daguerreotyped in the 
symptoms of the resulting diseases. Ship fever is the rude 
rhetoric of Baker street wretchedness, the very echo, the 
ideal, of its sin and suffering. 

The infected region lies but half a dozen squares from the 
State House, and although the veriest extremes of human 
life lie within so easy a distance, not one in a thousand of 
our citizens has ever seen the utter destitution and beastly 
degradation which infest that horrible place. Its cellars, 
garrets and hovels, defy all description. Our first view of 



BENEVOLENCE,' ETC. 321 

it brought to mind the reply of Mr. Dickens to a gentleman 
in Pittsburgh, when he was asked if he had not overdrawn 
the horrors of low life in London. " Overdrawn, overdrawn !" 
said he, " human language is not adequate to a just descrip- 
tion.' 7 

Everybody ought to see everything once in their lifetime. 
Go clown there on Sunday afternoon, when the sun is shin- 
ing, just at the moment when people are coming out of 
church, thread your w r ay through the well-dressed crowds 
upon the pavements on your way, turn into St. Mary's, find 
the narrowest avenue and take it ; somewhere near you will 
meet Mr. Mullen, and he will help you to a view of human 
life in its lees. Make your observations and take your 
notes. You need not fear that you will be solicited for pen- 
nies or have your pockets picked. Your presence will 
scarcely be felt, and you will suffer nothing from rudeness. 
Life is too languid there to be insolent, and hope and desire 
too feeble to be importunate. Return again some dismal 
•December evening in the twilight, dive into the cellars, 
climb into the garrets — take it coolly. It is not the place 
for emotion. Observe, treat the whole matter as a fact. 
"When you go home think it all over. Examine it as a pro- 
blem, and do your duty afterwards. You need not carry a 
sixpence along with you. Your donations will make but 
little difference upon the destiny of those people. 

The House of Industry last winter demonstrated that the 
worst of them could support themselves by sewing carpet 
rags when they got the whole profit of their own work. The 
women there who have not clothes enough to keep them 
warm, or food enough for one satisfactory meal a day, and 
have not skill of fingers enough to hem a kitchen towel well, 
can be maintained the whole winter at an expense of about 
a dollar apiece. Pay their room rent, buy rags for them, 

14* 



322 SIN AND SUFFERING. 

and give them only the profit of their work, and they will 
make from fifteen to thirty cents a day, and live well on it. 
If the profit on the provisions which they must buy in penny 
worths could be saved to them, they would get rich. 

We are not now suggesting a costly edifice, and a grand 
system of management, with the forms of pauperism pursued 
in the whole economy of the institution. A big warm room, 
and plenty of coarse work, all arranged • on business princi- 
ples, with an efficient agent, and no domineering and no 
parade — no begging, no anniversaries, no lecturing, and, 
above all, no benevolence and no show of it. Put fifty of 
those people on such a footing, and not one of them will 
dare to receive a gratuity from anybody. Do you believe 
this ? If you doubt, you have no vocation for the alleys 
and gutters of a metropolis. 

Something more than a year ago there were three hun- 
dred grog shops in the first ward of the District of Moya- 
mensing. In these rum was sold by the cent's worth, and 
lottery policies as low as three cents a share ! ! But these 
were not the causes of wretchedness that abounded there ; 
they were the consequences — -just as drinking and gambling 
in high life are the consequences of its particular kinds of 
want and destitution. A man can't die because he has 
nothing to do worth living for. If his best faculties are 
dead or suppressed, his lower life must come out the stronger. 
Death and hell — inactivity and perversion — go together. 

One of the companions of our childhood, a noble natured 
fellow, with the frame and energies of a giant, and the char- 
acter of a gentleman brought up in the woods, became. a 
drunkard in contempt of the meagreness of actual life. We 
left him one day drunk, playing the ruffian at a sign-post in 
our native village. Seven years afterwards we found him 
in exactly the same place and circumstances. There he 



CIRCUMSTANCES. 323 

stood, in the undilapidatecl strength of his manhood, with a 
certain wholesomeness of look, and grandeur of physical 
proportions, which neither time nor intemperance could 
destroy. We accosted him bluntly with — ""Why, Alick ! 
have you been drunk ever since we parted seven years ago V 9 
He roused himself, cleared his broad brow of its matted 
locks, looked steadily into our eyes, and answered soberly 
and meaningly — " Xo, William, I got sober once, to see how 
things looked ; and when I discovered that the rule of life is 
boot hog or die, I got drunk again in disgust." 

The root of the matter is not reached when we are told 
that sin is the cause of suffering. What is the cause of sin ? 
— not its remote metaphysical cause, but its immediate cir- 
cumstantial cause. There is the place for us to meet it. 
The morality of the best of us owes much to our surround- 
ings. The unspiritual omnipotence of circumstances is an 
overmatch for the spiritual influence of opinions, in the 
majority of men. The laws of Heaven cannot be obeyed 
• anywhere but in the Kingdom of Heaven — within its organ- 
ization and economy — in its circumstances. Women have 
eaten their own children in the famine of besieged cities. 
Drowning men will fight like demons for a plank that pro- 
mises to float them ashore, and the hopeless will seek refuge 
from despair in the temporary insensibility of drunkenness. 
It is meat, drink and lodging to those that have no other — 
or, it is blessed forgetfulness. 

Let us look into it bravely. It is not restraints, prospec- 
tive penalties — repression, that regulates the life. Every 
faculty of humanity is given in reference and adaptation to 
its object. Attraction leads out our actions. Desires, 
affections — our lores — constitute our real life ; restraints are 
only negatives — so many nothings. Abraham abandoned 
his native country on the promise of a letter one ; he offered 



324 POOR-LAWS. 

up his only son in the certainty that he should receive tiim 
again. It is for the joy set before him that any man endures 
his cross and despises its shame. I Human nature, as long 
as a spark of it remains, will respond to its appropriate 
stimulus ; it will not resist the full play of its natural affini- 
ties. 

Prayer in the closet — tears at your own comfortable 
fireside ; but, in the highways, in the lanes and alleys, work, 
work for the sinning and the suffering. Preach repentance 
if you will, but in Heaven's name plant a ladder in it on 
which the wretch ean climb out of the slough of despondency. 

1848. 



POOR-LAWS. 

The present system of English Poor-Laws dates as early 
as the reign of Queen Elizabeth, A. D. 1600. The rates, 
as the poor-taxes are called, amounted, in 1600, to .£190,000; 
in 1100, to £820,000 ; in 1800, to four millions of pounds ; in 
1815, five millions and a half; in 1820 to above seven mil- 
lions, and 1830 above eight millions ; in 1835 to six and a 
quarter millions ; in 1840 and 1845 they stood at five and a 
half millions per annum. 

Wealth is badly distributed in a nation where so large a 
share of it must go back by force of necessity to the poor 
every year. There is nothing worse than poor-laws except 
the laws which make men poor. Indeed it would be hard 
on principle to show why only enough of the surplus wealth 
of a nation should be redistributed to keep the wretched 
barely alive. 

There is no foundation in right — it does not belong to 



HOMESTEAD EXEMPTION. 325 

the system of truth and justice, to force one man to sup- 
port another, either by poor-laws or othsr laws. If the 
rich have one dollar lawfully which they may not keep 
rightfully, let who will live or die, they hold it by wrong, 
not by right. Poor-laws are a bad cobble of a bad system. 
They are not just, but it is injustice that has made them 
necessary, and they are a confession of it, if rightly viewed. 
Property is a natural institution, but the laws of property 
rest, both in theory and fact, upon the policy of barbarism. 
— See Blackstone for the one, and the landed aristocracy of 
England for the other. 



HOMESTEAD EXEMPTION. 

The exemption of the homestead from compulsory sale for 
the payment of debt, though one of the principles of a new 
party in this country, is not a new policy in the history of 
landed property. 

Under the common law of England, real estate could not 
be sold or conveyed by the owner, nor could he subject his 
land to the payment of his debts, nor in any manner treat it 
as capital, or make it the basis of credit in business. Not 
even the consent of the lord from whom the land was imme- 
diately held, could enable the owner of a freehold to convey 
his estate to another, unless he first obtained the consent of 
his own next apparent or presumptive heir. The policy of 
these restrictions arose out of the feudal connection between 
the lord and the landholder, and was designed to preserve it; 
but it also comprehended and provided for the interests of the 
heir, with some reference, doubtless, to his rights and necessi- 
ties. The owner was also, for the same reasons, incapable of 
devising his real estate by will to another family, or even of 



B28 HOMESTEAD EXEMPTION. 

altering the course of its descent in his own, by imposing parti- 
cular limitations. Alienation was in theory impossible, because 
the grant was made on condition of personal services and 
fealty, which he could not at will devolve upon another ; and 
the heirs of the tenant in fee, always named in the grant, 
were held to be beneficially interested in it, and could not, 
therefore, be dispossessed without their consent. 

By degrees these restraints wore off. Trade and com- 
merce, growing with civilization, required increased capital, 
and property in land was gradually converted into a market- 
able commodity, and estates were unfettered to answer the 
enlarging exchanges. 

By a statute of Edward the First (A. D. 1292), all per- 
sons were enabled to make voluntary sales and conveyances 
of their freehold estates. But it was not until the time of 
Charles the Second (about 1670), that devising lands by 
will was allowed. 

Under the common law, the creditor could have satisfac 
tion of his debt only out of the goods and chattels of the 
debtor, and the present income of his lands ; but could not 
take possession of the lands themselves. The statute of 
Edward the First, five years earlier than that which allowed 
the sale of land by the owner without restriction, gave the 
writ of elegit to the judgment creditor, by which the defendant's 
goods and chattels were seizetl, and after being appraised, were 
delivered to the plaintiff at the price fixed, in satisfaction of 
his debt or claim. If the goods were not sufficient to dis- 
charge the debt, one-half of his freehold lands were also 
delivered to the plaintiff to be held till out of the rents, issues 
and profits the debt should be fully paid. By another law, 
made the same year, persons engaged in trade might pawn 
the whole of their lands until in like manner the debt was 
satisfied. This pledge is called statute merchant, and is of 



HOMESTEAD EXEMPTION. 327 

the nature of a judgment entered before the mayor of Lon- 
don or some chief magistrate of a city. Afterwards, a 
similar recognizance, with similar effects, was directed to 
be registered before the mayors of certain trading towns ; 
but these were permitted only among traders, for the benefit 
of commerce. 

In pursuance of the same policy, and limited to the same 
class of persons by the several statutes of bankruptcy, the 
whole of the bankrupt's lands are now subject to be sold for 
the benefit of creditors. 

Tenderness towards the heirs of real property, and regard 
for the family home, appear very distinctly in the charter of 
liberties granted by "William Perm to the Freemen of the 
Province of Pennsylvania, dated 1682, and commonly called 
"Laws agreed upon in England." By these laws it was 
provided "that all lands and goods shall be liable to pay 
debts except where there is legal issue, and then all the 
goods, and one-third of the land only." By an early act of 
the General Assembly, this liability was extended, providing 
"that all lands and goods shall be liable to pay debts, except 
where they shall be legal issue, and then all the goods, and 
one-half the land only, in case the land was bought before 
the debts were contracted." In 1688 the Legislature of the 
Province enacted "that all lands whatsoever, and houses, 
shall be liable to sale upon judgment and execution against 
the defendant, heirs, executors and administrators." But in 
1705 it was provided "that lands which within seven years 
may yield yearly rents or profits beyond all reprises, suffi- 
cient to pay the debt, interest and costs of suit, shall not be 
sold, but be delivered to the creditor at the appraised value, 
until his claim shall be satisfied in the same manner as lands 
are delivered upon writs of elegit in England. This law is 



328 HOMESTEAD EXEMPTION. 

now in force in Pennsylvania, modified as to the method, 
but not affected in principle. 

In nearly all the States of the Union, some reluctance 
and delay is shown in respect for title in landed estate. 
One very general restriction of the creditor's right of execu- 
tion is imposed, by forbidding him to resort to the land until 
the personal property of the debtor is first exhausted and 
found insufficient. In several of the States the debtor may 
redeem his land within a year after its sale under execution, 
by refunding the purchase money with interest. In some of 
them it cannot be sold unless it brings two-thirds of its 
appraised value, and in all, except four or five of them, 
there are some checks upon the sweeping desolation of a 
writ of execution. 

The old Hebrew rule which declared, "the land shall not 
be sold for ever," seems grounded on a principle worthy of 
the authority which Moses claimed for it. It allowed the 
owner to transfer the possession and sell the produce and 
profits of his land until the jubilee, but secured to him the 
right to redeem it sooner if he became able and willing. 
His own and his family's property in the soil could not be 
absolutely alienated. Law and religion combined to give 
sacredness a title at once necessary to happiness, independence 
and life. This divinely equitable and beneficent policy checked 
and limited the hungry mammonism of speculation, and long 
preserved the nation from the destructive inequality and 
desperate degradation of the mass, which an unlimited traffic 
in land alone can produce. 

To this periodical restitution of each parcel of land to its 
former owner, there belonged none of the evils which attached 
to the modern entailed estates at common law. In England 
no limit was set by the law to the extent of a man's acquisi- 



HOMESTEAD EXEMPTION. 329 

tions ; and entails, by preserving within the family for ever 
all the lands which in a succession of ages could, by the 
various luck of many generations, be acquired, and guarding 
the constantly augmenting domain from all possibility of 
diminution or distributions, tended only to aggravate the 
evils of land monopoly for the few, and land destitution for 
the many. The Hebrew system, by preserving every man's 
portion of the earth for ever for himself and his heirs, main- 
tained equality. 

The law of Entails acting upon unlimited acquisitions, 
although in principle every way consistent with the doctrine 
of absolute dominion over the soil, and the right to appropriate 
it in perpetuity, threatened consequences so intolerable, that 
the courts were obliged to interpose, and by a species of judi- 
cial legislation, break up the perpetuity of Entails, which 
the House of Lords prevented the Commons from doing by 
direct enactment. If Parliament had made the change, the 
juster medium would have been chosen, no doubt, and the 
homestead would have been exempted, while the excess would 
have been left to distribution by the accidents of fortune and 
the laws of descent. 

The Xational Reformers do well to guard their policy of 
exempting land from execution by limiting it to the home- 
stead ; and they prefer, their scheme by ascertaining and 
determining the quantity which any individual may acquire 
and hold under these conditions. Their plan, as we under- 
stand it, does not propose to distitrb vested titles, or to 
question rights created by existing laws, but leaves the} 
required equalization of landed property to the accidents of 
trade, and that distribution which follows the death of the 
present holder. 

In this country, the next generation would witness a gene- 
ral correction of all injurious inequalities, and the system of 



330 HOMESTEAD EXEMPTION. 

the reformers would prevent any recurrence of the evil by 
limiting the quantity that might be thereafter acquired. 

To us this seems all well devised, prudently guarded, not 
difficult of adjustment to things as they are, and founded 
also upon the principles of justice and enlightened policy. 

The subtraction of the market value of the soil from the 
commercial capital of the country, would not, in any degree, 
or to any effect, diminish the actual wealth of the community. 
The land would yield its fruits as before, and the real money 
and conventional credit would still perform their wonted 
functions, and would easily adapt themselves, without con- 
vulsion or violence, to the remaining values in exchange. 

Debt has long been treated as a crime of one of the par- 
ties to the offence, and punished in him with loss of land 
and goods, and forfeiture of personal liberty, with all the 
consequent suffering to his dependencies. This barbarism is 
passing away. It was not based upon any principle of 
trade, and could not promote any of its interests. The im- 
prisonment of the debtor, and the starvation of his wife and 
children, are now perceived to be more than a just protec- 
tion to the creditor, and severer punishment than misfortune 
and innocence should incur. To strip a man of all the 
means and comforts of life for debt simply, is to confound 
mistake and misfortune with crime, and to punish civil inju- 
ries as^if they were criminal offences. The nearer we can 
come to converting legal debts into debts of honor the 
greater security will be given to credit. Law remedies 
avail but little against roguery, and there is the less reason 
for retaining their barbarities against honest men. Opinion 
would give us a better government than constraint has ever 
yet afforded. 



FREEDOM OF THE PUBLIC LANDS. 331 



"FOR OUR ALTARS AND OUR HEARTHS." 

Under the Hebrew Common wealth and kingdom, the land 
could not be sold or alienated for ever. Neither king nor 
creditor could divest the meanest citizen of his right in the 
soil. The misfortunes or the crimes of the father could not 
oust his child from the possession. The cultivator of the land 
stood upon it the free tenant of the Lord of Lords, owning 
no other landlord. The homestead exemption, the home- 
stead sacreclness, gave to the man such dignity, and to the 
citizen such importance, that he could feel all the inspiration 
of the phrase, "My native land." 

Neither in conquest nor in defence were the soldiery of 
Israel ever excelled, while they had their own firesides and 
altars to fight for ; and the noble institutions of Moses 
operated by their own inherent force in achieving the gran- 
deur of the nation, accomplishing really much more for it 
by . their natural potency than the miracles which only 
relieved the people occasionally in great emergencies. 



FREEDOM OF THE PUBLIC LANDS. 

Secretary Walker, in his late annual report, recommends 
a reduction of the price of the public lands to twenty-five 
cents an acre. 

According to a table of the Commissioners of the General Land 
Office, hereto annexed, marked P., it appears that our whole public 
domain amounts to 1,442,217,889 acres, which, at the present mini- 
mum, price of $1 25 per acre, would make an aggregate value of 
$1,802,772,296. Regarding them, however, including our mineral 
lands, at twenty-five cents per acre, they would yield $'380,554,459. 



332 FREEDOM OF THE PUBLIC LANDS. 

Large as is this sum, our wealth as a nation would be more rapidly 
increased by the sale of all our agricultural lands, at very low rates, 
not exceeding twenty-five cents per acre, in small farms, to actual set- 
tlers and cultivators, and thus by enlarged products and exports 
insuring increased imports and augmented revenue ; as it is obvious, 
even with liberal appropriations, that our revenue from lands and 
customs will enable us to pay the public debt before its maturity. 

This proposition bears marks of a concession to the rapidly 
increasing opinion that the lands of the nation are, and 
ought to be, the property of all, and an object of speculation 
to none. But, this abatement of price, while it looks toward 
meeting the ability of the industrious poor to purchase, and 
so rendering them more accessible to the most needy and 
deserving, is fatally faulty, in the fact, that it, as much as 
the higher rate, denies the principle, and still more than any 
higher rate exposes these lands to speculation. At twenty- 
five cents per acre, money will be able to increase its mono- 
poly of them five-fold, and so more than counteract any good 
that the plan is otherwise capable of. 

The true doctrine is, let not the land be sold at all, but 
given in limited quantity, say 160 acres, to the actual set- 
tler. Forty dollars would be the cost of such a lot to the 
man who must strain every nerve to reach his location. 
This effectually excludes nine out of ten of those for whom 
the change is demanded, both on their own account and on 
that of their fellow-laborers in our crowded cities. 

The policy of the measure is to withdraw the industrious 
and enterprising man, whose labor gluts our markets, from a 
destructive competition with his fellow craftsmen around 
him — to avoid the reduction of wages to him and to them, 
which results from his presence and necessities, and so at 
once to secure the well-being and independence of all, and at 
the same time distribute productive industry better than 



FREEDOM OF THE PUBLIC LANDS. 333 

limited means for travelling and purchasing lands at the 
present or any price will allow. 

A man of some means can choose how he will invest them, 
and the business for which he is best qualified. Destitution 
of funds compels the poor man to work at the business that 
demands or admits him, and, fit or unfit, he must submit. 
Freedom to labor is not too much to ask from the govern- 
ment, so far as it can give it, and this means opportunity 
for adapted labor, if it means anything. I am free to work 
at painting and engraving, but I am not capable of either. 
This is like the freedom of the gospel to the Indians, printed 
only in Greek. So of the trades and occupations from 
which the people and the children of the people must choose. 

The men of property and influence in our cities have not 
given the subject the reflection it deserves. Economically, 
merely, it must relieve them of their poor-rates and cheapen 
their provisions. The temptation of lands for the settling, 
would attract thousands of stragglers from the crowded 
workshops, who would not be able to appropriate forty dol- 
lars, besides travelling expenses, to the enterprise. And 
the control it would exert over the effects felt and feared 
from the constantly increasing immigration of foreigners, is 
of the highest importance. 

We do not now stop to argue the justice of the measure. 
The beneficence of it is proof enough of its rectitude and of 
its obligation. Who can tell how mspirmgly it would come 
to the hovels of poverty ? The unfortunate who has lost 
his faith in the world's equity and in the care of Providence, 
would look up with a start at the word which announced to 
him his right to a home, accorded by the justice of society. 
He would feel no longer that he is a vagabond upon the 
face of the earth ; but that he is only a traveller with a 
home awaiting him. The bitterness of his rebellion against 



334 FREEDOM OF THE PUBLIC LANDS. 

the laws of property would be taken away. Benevolences 
degrade while they relieve him, but the justice which offered 
him independence must compel his respect. Justice? In 
one respect anything less than this is a fraud. If the lands 
of the nation belong to the whole people, the extremely poor 
have no other way of getting their share. To put their 
price into the treasury for the support of government, 
relieves only those who have other property to be taxed. 
The destitute man has none, and his land is thus given to 
those who are enjoying their own share and other property 
besides. Fourteen hundred millions of acres ought not to be 
all taken away from the poor. 

The cheapness of land is all that makes the difference 
between the laborers of Europe and America now. The 
absolute freedom of our vast public domain from monopoly 
and speculation, and its consecration to the life and liberties 
of the poor, will protect us from the fearful curse of a 
degraded and hopeless caste, tQ consist of our own country- 
men, born to no inheritance but toil ; and of the immigrants 
from other countries, who have been torn from the bosom of 
their mother earth by the wealth which wrenches from them 
their blessing and birthright. Even for the sake of the 
rich, let there be no class of landless men — miserable multi- 
tudes, arrayed against the more fortunate class under the 
horrid battle-cry of " bread or blood." 

Capital has ample means and materials, without convert- 
ing the free deserts on our borders into a marketable com- 
modity and a field of ruthless speculation. Our National 
Independence and honor are secured ; — the personal liberty 
and dignity of the individual man, whose pauperism converts 
his share of the Republic's glory into mockery, must be pro- 
vided for and maintained. Freedom of the public lands to 
actual settlers in limited quantities and exemption from exe- 



WAGES ON THE RISE. 335 

cution for debt, alone can put the masses into the actual 
enjoyment of that liberty which our institutions promise in 
words. This will provide for the wants of those who may 
avail themselves, and relieve the manufacturing districts of 
the pressure of competition for work, which must be removed, 
or — wages become the price of liberty, and labor sinks into 
bondage. 

1848. 



WAGES ON THE RISE. 

The average wages of agricultural laborers in England, 
last year, were forty cents a day. The wages of journeyman 
carpenters now, in Waterford, Ireland, are eighty-three 
cents a day. 

In Central India the wages of field laborers are now six 
cents a day, he finding his own food ; women receive four and 
a half cents, and boys three cents. House servants are bet- 
ter paid, as they are obliged to wear rather better clothes. 

Thirty years ago a field hand cost his owner, in the 
Southern States, less than a dollar a week (interest on his 
price, and cost of keep) ; now, the cost is twice as much. 

In 1851, average wages at Lowell, Massachusetts, in the 
factories, for females, thirty-three cents a day ;. for males, 
eighty cents, clear of board ; or fifty-two cents a day for 
females, and one dollar twelve cents for males, without board. 
The wages in 1840 were precisely the same there. 

The wages of labor at Greenwich Hospital, England, for 
carpenters, bricklayers and masons doubled from A. D. 1135 
to 1828, (from two shillings and sixpence to five shillings 
per day). 



336 WAGES OX THE RISE. 

The wages of husbandry labor in England, in the year It 00, 
were equal to the then price of fifty-four pints of wheat ; in 
1190, to eighty-two pints ; in 1832, to ninety pints. (Sixty- 
four pints make a bushel.) 

Prom "William Penn's cash book it appears that in 1699 
it required 131 days of unskilled labor to earn a ton of flour 
— cash wages, thirty-three cents a day. In 1834, such a 
laborer at Philadelphia could earn a ton of flour in seventy- 
eight days — cash wages, seventy-fire cents per day. Flour 
was, at the former period, $45.34 ; at the latter, §58.32 
per ton. 

Thus, in 132 years in England, the wages of unskilled 
labor had nearly doubled, when estimated in wheat. In cash 
they had quite doubled, and in nearly all other commodities 
required for the support and comfort of life, they had many 
times multiplied their nominal value. Even in the year 1813, 
a cottager's Sunday hat cost 20 shillings, now 1 shillings ; a 
shirt, 10s. 6d., now 3 shillings ; calico, 2s. 9d., now 6d.; 
brown sugar, 10d., now Ad. In 14 years, from 1820 to 1834, 
cotton cloth fell from 12fd to 6d. In these years the price 
of cloth diminished 51 per cent.; wages remaining in money- 
price the same. But what is more remarkable, the money- 
price of all the British and Irish products and manufactures 
exported from England had fallen in these fourteen years full 
forty per cent. The reduction continued steadily till, in 1850, 
§41.63 would purchase as much of all the articles which 
make up the multiform exports of Great Britain, as §94 
would have purchased thirty years before. The money wages 
remaining the same, the real wages had more than doubled 
in thirty years in perhaps everything but wheat and house-rent. 

The wages of women in the United States, measured in the 
same way, have trebled since the year 1818 — the period of 
the general introduction of machinery into manufactories. 



THE UNITED STATES OF THE UNITED RACES. 337 

The wages of husbandry in France have in like manner 
trebled in 130 years. While the process of doubling the real 
wages of labor was going on in England, the population 
rose from five to fourteen millions. 

The facts of political economy must have another and 
fairer hearing than the old school authorities could give them. 
Increase of population, and the unlimited multiplication of 
products by the use of machinery, do not depress wages, but 
on the contrary, the improvement of the condition of the 
laborer everywhere keeps even pace with all such increase. 

The laws which govern society are better than the disciples 
of the dismal science imagine. Life is not necessarily a bat- 
tle, nor is humanity a failure. We have, indeed, a great 
deal to learn, but we have as much to hope for, which will 
come in the fullness of time. The present good of this faith 
is, that we can thank God and take courage. 



THE UNITED STATES OP THE UNITED RACES. 

The Chinese are flocking into California ; the Hindoos are 
being transported to Jamaica, Cuba, and Guiana, with the 
current drifting thence, as well as directly from the East, 
into the Union, to be increased by the proceeding revolutions, 
whether successful or disastrous ; Hungary, Italy, and, ere 
long, Turkey, will be swelling the tide ; Western Europe is 
here already, principal and interest ; we have four millions 
of Africans and their descendants ; and Scandinavia is float- 
ing in, like the icebergs, to melt into the current upon our 
shores. 

Whether the varieties of the race began in one family or 
not, they are destined to meet in one family of people at last. 

15 



338 THE UNITED STATES OF THE UNITED RACES. 

Here mountains cannot divide, nor tongues distinguish 
peoples. When Pagan Rome subdued the world into one 
empire, she still held the nations at a provincial distance from 
herself, and from each other ; she tolerated their distinctive 
religions, and perpetuated their social diversity. The rela- 
tions established by force had but small tendency to induce 
those which bring unity and harmony. But Christ was born, 
He proclaimed the equal worth of every human soul. He 
was a son of David, but he described himself the son of Man 
— the second Adam. He died for all men, giving them the 
new commandment — "Love one another, as I have loved, 
you," and " He is not ashamed to call them brethren (to 
himself and of each other), for he that sanctifieth, and they 
who are sanctified, are all of one." 

Papal Rome carried the idea one stage forward towards 
the destined fulfilment ; gathering the tribes which accepted 
her faith into one spiritual fold, and, in a good degree, recon- 
ciling and uniting them in interest and policy. But it 
remained for Protestantism to shake off the shackles of civil 
and ecclesiastical despotism, which still hindered the brother- 
hood of the race ; and, for Republicanism to furnish the 
institutions, and find the theatre, for the actual realization 
of "Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity" to all men. 

It is coming, and must come. America has every variety 
of climate and soil, with all the accommodations of political 
and religious institutions, and room enough, besides, for the 
wide world's widest range of wants, and the happiest condi- 
tions for the furtherance of its welfare. 

Our system of federal unity will be found as capable of 
allowing and ordering, retaining and restraining, Mormonism 
as Slavery, in its separate States ; and Catholicism and Pro- 
testantism will no more unsettle it than the gyrations of the 
earth and moon, in their scuffle for a compromise orbit, can 



THE UNITED STATES OF THE UNITED RACES. 339 

shake the solar system out of place. The sun ;>an stand the 
perturbations with which the sovereign States in his empire 
agitate his throne. They tug him about eternally ; but 
with all his wriggling, his orbit, as he is pleased to call his 
constitutional stagger, never falls out of his own diameter, so 
that he is always about home ; and even his eclipses abate 
his power and dim his glory, so little, that you must look 
through a stained glass, to see and enjoy them, if you like to 
catch him in an occasional difficulty. 

There is no use in falling into hysterics about our doings 
and destiny. "We are wound up to go, and need nothing 
but a little regulating to keep us exact to the time. The 
pendulum swings on, regular, steady, and true ; and when 
we strike, the world knows the time of day near enough for 
the regulation of its affairs. Xice calculations mav show 
that we gain or lose a little upon the chronometer of the 
heavens, but it does not frighten us, for we are so well on 
with our work, that we have a handful of minutes to spare. 
We have a good start ; we are on the right track ; and, if 
we don't tunnel right through every obstacle in our direct 
pathway, we will, nevertheless, recover the route, with the 
loss of a little time and distance, and so reach our destination 
at last. 

It is bad citizenship to despair of the commonwealth. A 
man ought to love his country something better than a fellow 
who is always kicking his mother, to mend her manners. 
The dear old lady may "have so many children that she don't 
know what to do f and when they "growl and fight as bears 
ami lions do," she may be obliged sometimes to settle the hash 
without doing exact justice to all the little belligerents that 
she has to manage ; but the family is safe, and will learn to 
behave themselves as they grow older and wiser. Some of 
the children are so stubborn, some so sharp, others so bois- 



340 THE UNITED STATES OF THE UNITED RACES. 

terous, and some of them so nearly silly, and all so selfish, 
that the household is always in disturbance. And, there 
are the servants ! "But everybody knows what a plague 
servants always are, and ours do seem to be the hardest to 
manage in the world. If there was only some way of doing 
without them altogether, it would be such a relief. Some 
people say there ought not to be any. They are infidels, of 
course ; for the Scripture says that there will always be poor 
people to be taken care of, and one oughtn't to wish what 
isn't allowed. But it does seem almost as if they were sent 
upon us for our sins." 

So runs the complaint, translated into the gossip dialect 
« — which is the fittest for such grumbling that we are 
acquainted with. 

And now there has arisen a new trouble : the Chinese are 
gathering in such numbers in California, that the question 
arises, What if they were to apply for naturalization ? They 
are not white, certainly, and just as certainly they are not 
black ; and, partus sequitur ventrem ! (which is Latin for 
cursing a nigger) these barbarians are free born, and cannot 
be legally reduced to chattel slavery; for they were not 
caught in Africa, nor smuggled into the State in handcuffs. 
And what is to be done about it, the Alta California and 
the St. Louis Intelligencer are in a pucker to guess. They are 
not white, it is agreed, and this these editors would fain believe 
sufficient; but that will not do. White in slave-law language 
does not mean color, but descent. A negro is a slave, 
though an albino, with alabaster skin, pink eyes, and silver 
white hair. Trace the whitest and handsomest woman in 
Charleston to the stock for two centuries devoted to the Ame- 
rican yoke, and she goes to the auction block, and the dark- 
est-colored man in the nation may buy her and be her 
owner. 



THE UNITED STATES OF THE UNITED RACES. 341 

It is not color, but kindred, that settles the question. 
Cursed be Canaan, or Cush, or Quashee, or whoever has 
wool so curly that it first grows out of his head, and then 
grows in again ; but any human being whose ancestors had 
hair long enough to wear tails to their heads, are out of the 
scrape. It won't do, gentlemen, to take the people who 
manufacture your silks, porcelain, fans, crapes, and carved 
ivory, and exchange their tea for your dollars, and reduce 
them to slavery. Isor will you attempt it. They actually 
have treaties with our Government, and our Executive sends 
no less a dignitary than R. J. Walker a minister to the head 
of their nation ; and you are without principle, prescription, 
precedent, or prophecy, for your purpose. 

What then will you do with them? If they have the 
arts, industry and frugality, that are available in the civil- 
ized scramble for wealth, and you let them into the country, 
the municipal laws which are equal in their operation upon 
all the inhabitants, will secure their prosperity, and you will 
not be able to deprive them either of personal liberty, or civil 
rights and political power. You may exterminate the 
Indians, and hold the Africans in chattel slavery, but you 
cannot put civilization, well advanced in the industrial arts, 
under the ban of barbarism or of color. Their idolatry was 
an objection yesterday, but to-day there are a million of them 
professing our own religion, and to-morrow Christianity may 
be on the throne of the Celestial Empire. When they come 
to us baptized, with the ten commandments in their hands, 
and the faith of the Redeemer in their hearts, your religious 
reason for degrading and enslaving them will be nonplussed, 
and your piety itself will be their pleader. 

In short, the doctrine of despotism, ecclesiastical and poli- 
tical, which has served you so well and so long in the extreme 
cases to which it has been applied, is going to be gradually 



342 THE UNITED STATES OF THE UNITED RACES. 

dissolved in the intermediate shades of coloring to which it 
will be exposed, so that you will not be able to tell black 
from white, for any purpose that you now make the distinc- 
tion. Reason, religion and republicanism, have all failed 
with you ; but now Providence is about to take you in hand, 
and you are as good as done for. 

If Fum Hoam can learn Christianity as well as silk-weav- 
ing and card-painting, he can substitute phonography for 
his alphabet of forty thousand characters ; and, after call- 
ing you brother for a generation or so, in good Yankee, he 
will marry your cousin, and then, how will you keep him out 
of Congress? The "home of the exile and the asylum of 
-the oppressed" will surely vindicate its pretensions, and 
justify its boast, by vindicating the liberty, equality and 
fraternity of man, in despite of your resistance. 

When the United Colonies revolted, they did not think of 
limiting the controversy to the Anglo-Saxon race, but they 
appealed to God and the world for the right of all men to 
life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. God and the 
world took them at their word, and will hold us to the con- 
tract ; and here, in these United States, every kindred and 
tongue and people under heaven will, ere long, sit down and 
enjoy the blessings which you think our fathers should have 
reserved as well as "secured for ourselves and for our 
posterity." 

And so, you will please to consider this matter settled 
by the fiat of Fate, and comport yourselves accordingly. 

1863. 



ENGLAND AND THE TURKISH QUESTION. 343 

EXGLAXD AXD THE TURKISH QUESTION. 

In 1116, Adarn Smith said the whole object of the Eng- 
lish system was " to raise up colonies of customers — a pro- 
ject/ 7 he added, " fit only for a nation of shopkeepers." In- 
deed, he thought it " unfit even for a nation of shopkeepers, 
although extremely fit for a nation whose Government was 
influenced by shopkeepers." That was her portrait in pro- 
file, three-quarters of a century ago. To give a full-face 
view of the nation, justice required that the beer and beef 
should be laid in, that the bully side of her character might 
fairly appear ; but since that day, traffic has taken the 
tone out of her temper, and she has little left but the tricky 
pliabilities of a confirmed huckster. A little while ago she 
had pluck enough to mingle the " balance of power" some- 
what bravely with the "balance of interest" in her foreign 
policy, but now she has so interwoven her own existence 
into the web of universal commerce, that she dare not for 
her life offend a customer. Her policy has long been to 
make herself the workshop of the world, the sole buyer of 
all the raw products of the nations, and sole seller of the 
manufactured commodities to be exchanged for them, with 
the power to fix the prices of both. 

By her treaty of Methuen with Portugal, in 1103, she 
obtained the control of the market of that country for the 
sale of her manufactures, agreeing to give, in compensation, 
the Portuguese wines a great advantage over those of 
Prance. The result is that the manufactures of Portugal 
have sunk to nothing, and her commerce, once the medium 
for interchanging the products of the East and West, 
has become a mere shadow. Her wool and salt go to Eng- 
land, her wines are monopolized there, and she has at last 
become a burden to her destroyer. 



344 ENGLAND AND THE TURKISH QUESTION. 

Turkey, also, has a treaty with her, now more than a 
century old ; by the terms of which, that Governmet bound 
itself to charge no more than three per cent, duty on Brit- 
ish imports. Her industry has long been paralyzed. ■ Up 
till the close of the last century Turkey still exported cot- 
ton yarn in considerable quantity. Now, even its culture 
is abandoned ; and her internal trade is in the hands of 
foreign peddlers. 

Mr. Cobden has recently said that these ancient allies of 
Great Britain have become a curse to her, and are no lon- 
ger worth preserving. The fate of these two colonized cus- 
tomers of John Bull is well illustrated by the story of an 
Irish tenant of an English absentee landlord. The poor 
fellow had been for a series of years paying his rent out of 
his little capital, until it was well nigh exhausted ; but as 
he had no better choice, and was still able to meet the rent, 
he asked a new lease. He was answered: "You are no 
longer entirely safe at quarter-day, you have been growing 
poorer year after year, and I must have a sounder man." 

India is another instance of the effects of the British sys- 
tem of centralizing the trade of the world in her own hands. 
Bengal was once celebrated for the finest muslins ; the 
Coast of Coromandel for chintzes and calicoes ; and "Western 
India for the manufacture of strong inferior goods of every 
kind. Nearly a century since, the battle of Plassey estab- 
lished the British power over that wealthy, prosperous 
and happy country. To suppress the native rivalry of manu- 
factures, every loom, anvil, barber's hone, cotton-beater's 
bow, carpenter's tool, oil mill, potter's kiln, iron manufac- 
tory, fishing beat, fishing net, was taxed to the utmost 
value of its productive power, and the result is told in the 
language of Bishop Heber — "an impenetrable jungle now 
surrounds the once great manufacturing city of Dacca." 



ENGLAND AND THE TURKISH QUESTION. 345 

Mr. George Thompson, not long since in the House of 
Commons, reminded the Government that at the close of the 
last century cotton abounded, and to so great an extent was 
the labor of men, women and children applied to its conver- 
sion into cloth, that, even with their imperfect machinery, they 
not only supplied the home demand for the beautiful tissues of 
Dacca, and the coarser products of Western India, but they 
exported to other parts of the world no less than 200,000,000 
of pieces per annum. After the improvements in manufactures 
were fairly introduced into England, the export of machinery 
and artisans to India being rigorously prohibited, and free 
trade in foreign commodities established, so as to expose 
the native manufacturers to unlimited competition, the 
export of cotton from Bengal, in lo^T sunk to £285,121; 
and in 1847, a whole year passed without the export of a 
single piece of cotton from Calcutta. Since 1813, the 
export of cottons from India constantly declined, until it 
has at length ceased altogether ; and the export of raw cot- 
ton has, at a corresponding pace, risen until it has attained 
the height of sixty millions of pounds. England sends back 
about twenty-five millions pounds of twist, and of cloth two 
hundred and sixty millions of yards. Thus every pound of 
raw cotton sent to England is returned manufactured, after 
having travelled twenty thousand miles in search of the spin- 
dle, and left nearly its whole value in the hands of brokers, 
transporters, manufacturers, and operatives, thus interposed 
between the producer and consumer. 

Mr. George Thompson, in one of his lectures upon India, 
sums up the results of the British rule there in terms so 
striking that we cannot forbear a few extracts : " Some of 
the finest tracts of land have been forsaken, and given up 
to the untamed beasts of the jungle. The motives to indus- 
try have been destroyed. The soil seems to lie under a 

15* 



846 ENGLAND AND THE TURKISH QUESTION. 

curse. Instead of yielding abundance for the wants of its 
own population, and the inhabitants of other regions, it 
does not keep in existence its own children. It becomes 
the burying place of millions crying for bread. This, in 
British India, in the reign of Victoria the First !" 

The same system extended to Ireland, has reduced her 
population to exclusive agriculture, that they might be the 
purchasers of English manufactures. Ireland was prohibited 
from exporting woollens and glass to the colonies. In 1800, 
Dublin employed 4,918 hands in woollen manufactures ; in 
1840, 602 ! At Cork, in 1800, there were thousands of 
cotton spinners, bleachers, and calico-printers ; in 1834, 
there were none. This is a fair sample of the condition to 
which the whole island has been reduced by British rule. 
The loss of 1,659,000 of her population, between the years 
1840 and 1850, by famine, pestilence and emigration, 
expresses the facts, and indicates the tendencies, with the 
solemnity of a tombstone. 

The London Times utters the inference of Tory logic from 
the data afforded by English policy, with the terseness of 
tragic poetry. Speaking of Ireland, that paper says : For 
a whole generation man has been a drug, and population a 
nuisance. Ireland has been England's customer, till the 
expulsion of her people is the only remedy left for the bur- 
den which their redemptionless poverty inflicts upon those 
who have exhausted them. 

The British West Indies, kept carefully by taxation and 
prohibition from manufacturing any of her own products, 
were driven, first to insolvency, and then compensated for 
the sudden annihilation of their slave property, by an appro- 
priation of twenty millions, which just covered their indebt- 
edness to British bankers, brokers and jobbers ! 

And so, in one grand round of ruinous repetitions, Turkey, 



ENGLAND AND THE TURKISH QUESTION. 317 

Portugal, Ireland, India, the West Indies, have been sacri- 
ficed to her rapacity, and she all the less able to spare a 
cripple that she has made, or a fresh victim that she is 
watching for. 

The policy that in a century has reduced India from 
wealth to ruin, driven its population from prosperous indus- 
try of every kind into the cultivation of opium for the 
destruction of China, and the Hindoos themselves to the 
swamps of Jamaica and Guiana — that has impoverished 
Turkey and Portugal, and more than decimated Ireland — is 
distinctly propounded in Joshua Gee's work " on trade," 
published in 1750. He says : "Manufactures in American 
colonies should be discouraged, prohibited. We ought 
always to keep a watchful eye over our colonies, to restrain 
them from setting up any of the manufactures which are 
carried on in Great Britain. Our colonies are much in the 
same state as Ireland was when they began the woollen 
manufactory, and, as their numbers increase, will fall upon 
manufactures for clothing themselves, if due care be not 
taken to find employment for them in raising such produc- 
tions as may enable them to furnish themselves with all the 
necessaries from us." 

The reasons given are summed up thus : " If we examine 
into the circumstances of the inhabitants of their plantations 
and our own, it will appear that not one-fourth part of 
their products redound to their own profit ; for, out of all 
that comes here, they only carry back clothing and other 
accommodations for their families, all of which is of the 
merchandise and manufacture of this kingdom." 

Lord Grey, in 1850, phrases the policy differently, but 
presses it to the same object and effect. 

The system of a century, growing ever stronger and 
stronger, is, indeed, fully expressed in the " Centralization 



348 ENGLAND AND THE TURKISH QUESTION. 

of Commerce in England/ 9 making her " the workshop of 
the world/' making of themselves " a nation of shopkeepers," 
and substantially " colonizing every country she trades 
with." 

Let us see, now, how this system affects her in her proper 
function of maintaining the balance of power in Europe, and 
vindicating the public law of nations. 

The London Times of a late date has drawn out the argu- 
ment, in an article upon English intervention in the quarrel 
pending between Russia and Turkey. Let the reader look 
at the involvement which this article confesses, and apply 
to it the criticism which our suggestions afford for the true 
comprehension of its meaning and drift : 

"Byway of set-off against the novelty, the excitement, the enter- 
prise, the popularity, and the possible glory of a war with Russia, let 
us just set down and count the cost. We could shut up the naval 
power of Russia in the Black Sea and the Baltic by costly fleets at 
both stations ; steam always up, wind and water always having their 
way. We could easily enable Turkey to make a desperate fight, by 
enormous subsidies. We could protect our commerce from Yankee 
privateers, and other free-and-easy gentlemen who could take out 
letters of marque from Russia, by a recurrence to the old system of 
merchantmen sailing, like wild geese, in flights, with a frigate or two 
leading the way. We could suspend the whole foreign commerce of 
Russia, by a process which would double the price of our corn, hemp, 
and tallow. We could engage half the continent on our side of the 
quarrel, by surrendering every other question of honor, duty, or 
interest, we happen to have with each separate State. We could pro- 
long the war indefinitely, by another national debt. We could stop 
it at our pleasure, by allowing Russia to take all she wants, with a 
little over for demurrage. With proportionate bribes we could secure 
the concurrence of other nations. 

" On the other hand, all the nations of Europe would be bankrupt, 
their principal creditors being in this metropolis. Their manufac- 
tures and commerce would be ruined, to the injury of those who con- 
sume what they make, and make for them in return. We are all so 



ENGLAND AND THE TURKISH QUESTION. 349 

bound together that it is hard to say whether, in material conse- 
quences, we should suffer more by victory or by defeat. It is our 
unhappiness to have the largest stake in peace of all nations on the 
face of the earth, and, so long as we stick to that game, we are sure 
to win. The most orthodox war ever fought is only an Irishman's 
row — a game of cracked skulls and bloody noses — very amusing to 
those whose clothing is of little value, and whose natural integument 
is rather hard ; but far from amusing to a gentleman who has paid 
five guineas for his coat, and whose face is susceptible of contusions. 
There is not a point in which that immense glass house which we 
call the British Empire is not liable to damage. ' A man that hath 
children,' says Bacon, ' hath given pledges to fortune.' We have chil- 
dren — we have colonies, we have dependencies, we have ships, we 
have investments, loans, railways, private debts — all over the world. 
By dint of hard peace-making, we manage to keep our creditors 
in tolerable order. They pay, as an omnibus-horse does its work, 
by the momentum of their misery — by being kept in harness, well up, 
and continually flogged. Once give them the opportunity of war, 
and that general dissolution of morals that is sure to ensue, and every 
quarter-day will add to your defaulters. All this, of course, is 
very extraneous to the real merits of the present question. Those 
merits we do not here discuss. But you have known people who in 
private life went to law, or rather resisted actions, when the right 
was most clearly on their side, and when the verdict was given accord- 
ingly, but who, nevertheless, lost thereby, both in purse and in fame, 
having to suffer much annoyance to pay large costs, and to incur, 
also, the reputation of being litigious and troublesome fellows. That 
which happens in the regular and genial atmosphere of English 
society, and under the pure and impeccable administration of Eng- 
lish justice, may easily happen in the society, and forum, and arena 
of nations, viz : that the prosecution of the justest quarrel may 
entail a martyr's obloquy and cross. 11 

Does this mean anything but that Great Britain is bound 
to keep the peace of the world, against its interests and her 
own honor, and to submit for herself to any injury and 
indignity that her universal trade and monopoly of manu- 
factures may in any emergency require ; and aid and abet, 
besides, any outrage upon the oppressed nations of the Con- 



350 CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 

tinent, whose defence might involve a general war ? Call 
upon her now, for any influences agency that justice and 
duty demand; and her honest answer is, that she cannot 
afford it. 

How have the mighty fallen ! This it is, to be a nation 
of shopkeepers ; this, to have converted herself into the work- 
shop of the world. 

England is rapidly running down to rank among the 
meanest of the nations. She is a bully, indeed ; but then 
she is also a huckster, and her duties are measured by the 
yard-stick ; and all her fine qualities and all her traditional 
honors go for nothing, whenever her trade is endangered ! 
Russia can browbeat her ; South Carolina can bluff her off; 
for, behold, she has adopted peace principles as a fundamen- 
tal morality in the policy of trade. Perhaps she may 
discover that it is best, upon the whole, to get France em- 
broiled on the continent ; perhaps France may precipitate 
her into the struggle ; but an embargo or a blockade is her 
terror, next to extermination. 

1S53. 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 

A friend has handed us an editorial article cut from the 
North American, which was published some months ago, 
when the bill for the abolition of the death penalty was 
before the legislature. It takes the ground that the " object 
of punishment is self defence ;" "it is the protection of soci- 
ety by inspiring a fear that may deter from the commission 
of crime. ' Society must deter from crime by the terror of 
punishment.' ' The question is, what penalty will, without 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 351 

unnecessary torture, inspire the greatest horror ? It is death 
for death.' ' As most powerful to deter, it is necessary to 
the safety of society.' Murders are multiplying with frightful 
rapidity : is such the proper time to relax its penalties ? ;? 

Yes, murders are multiplying with frightful rapidity. A 
week or two since there were eight persons in our County 
Jail charged with homicide. This is indeed a frightful 
increase. In fifty years, the criminal calendar of this county 
exhibited but one hundred and ten cases; only ten of these 
were convicted of murder in the first degree, and no more 
than five of them were executed. And of these five, it is 
worth remarking, that Lieut. Smith, who killed Captain 
Carson, was perhaps the only gentleman — the only man that 
anybody cared to save from the gallows. 

Xow, the death penalty has not been abrogated. It is in 
full force ; nothing of its proper power to protect society 
by legislative interference has been abated ; and nothing, 
for which the opponents of the gallows 'are responsible, dimi- 
nishes its influence to defend the lives of the people. It has 
the freest, fullest sweep that, in its own nature, it is capable 
of ; and therefore, has had among ourselves the fairest trial 
of its supposed efficacy. 

Its friends have the unembarrassed use of all its power, to 
" deter from the commission of crime." Every man who is 
opposed to inflicting death by law for murder, is, by the rules 
and practice of our courts, excluded from the juries which 
pass upon the guilt of the offenders. Every man is put to 
the question, by the attorney-general, concerning his senti- 
ments upon this subject, before he is permitted to enter the 
jury box. We have seen more than twenty persons rejected 
in this city in one murder case, on this account. The ten- 
derness or conscientiousness of the abolitionists is never in 
any case permitted to affect the result. They are not 



352 CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 

chargeable with the escape of a single criminal, who by the 
law incurs its utmost penalty. No man either on the bench 
or in the jury box, except those who have no scruples or 
objections to hanging, ever sits in judgment upon the life of 
a murderer. 

Where then is the fault that murders multiply ? Wherever 
it lies, the gallows does not deter as its advocates assume. 
There is the North American's mistake. It is not a foolish 
philanthropy of ours that leaves life defenceless. If there 
be any better way within the reach of the community, it is 
the mistaken cruelty of the gallows party which must bear 
the blame. The editors simply assume the position that, 
"death for death is the most powerful to deter," and quote 
poetry to prove that "the weariest and most loathed worldly 
life is paradise to what we fear in death." They make no 
appeal to the world's experience of the scaffold's protective 
power, and they offer no philosophy for the opinion. 

We cannot now, within the space allowed us, confront 
them with the facts which might determine the point most 
conclusively. They can find them, if they wish the informa- 
tion, in unanswerable 'array, in Livingston's Criminal Code, 
page 213, et seq., and elsewhere in works of acknowledged 
authority. 

They must know that many a foolish notion has passed 
current in the world, for a long time, though right reason 
and every day's experience contradicted them. This imagined 
dread of violent death may be one of them. Death on the 
battle-field is, in general, a pretty fair probability, yet men 
enlist without the impulse of the highest motives. Street 
rows and suicides, brawls and duels, afford no evidence of 
this terror ; and reckless wretchedness and furious passions 
are notoriously blind to the risks they run. Nay, thousands 
of violent men distinctly contemplate the fatal issue, and 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 353 

adventure it deliberately. The fear of death is not the 
strongest instinct of disordered or distressed humanity. 

We agree with the advocates of capital punishment that, 
society has the right to defend itself — that, it is its duty to 
protect its members against the murderer, and that, it may 
take life if that is the remedy. But we deny this — -just this. 
Give us something more conclusive than poetry or ill consi- 
dered opinion upon this point. We deny that either the facts 
of experience or the truth of philosophy, support the position 
which the North American assumes, unquestioned and 
unproved. 

If they can settle this point for us, we may inform them 
what we mean by our duty to the criminal himself. In the 
meantime, we have the right to tell them that scoffing at our 
kindness to the criminal is unbecoming Christian men, and 
that charging it to improbable and impossible motives, 
is not creditable to their understanding. Do they really 
think that any reformer of the criminal code prefers the com- 
forts and happiness of the murderer in prison, to the life of 
his victim, and the security of society ? If they do not, it 
is extremely improper to employ the language which they 
use in this part of their remarks ; but if they do believe 
that the reformation of the offender, and such kindness as 
may consist with that object, means indifference to his crime, 
or to the safety of the community, they have something to 
learn that will make them better and happier when they 
know it. 

Their allusions to the New York prison festivals ought to 
be reconsidered. If they had witnessed one of them, and 
fairly understood it, they would never again speak of Mrs. 
Farnham's sentiments and policy with disapprobation. It 
is very sad to perceive how inconsiderate men become under 
the influence of prejudice and partial knowledge. " What 



O04 CAPITAL PUNISHMENT, 

becomes of punishment," they ask, "amid all this kindness, 
this luxury of smooth- beds and luxurious boards ?" "Will 
the Editors tell us, if hell itself reforms no sinner, how human 
hatred and harshness will achieve it ? Or do they hold that 
our penitentiaries are properly the shadows of bad things to 
come, and that hope and mercy are out of place for those 
whom human laws condemn ? 

We know one story that would make them believe it bet- 
ter that ninety-nine offenders should escape than that one 
just person should be destroyed. We know another, of a 
Sing Sing prisoner that would reconcile them to any prudent 
effort to reclaim a vicious woman : 

A profligate from the Five Points, who had never known 
anything of the law but its severities, or of society, but its 
injustice, was committed for a long term on the charge of 
larceny. When she reached the State prison, supposing 
that its superintendent must be an ogress, when constables 
and judges were so unfeeling, she resolved upon resistance 
to the death. For weeks Mrs. Farnham met with nothing 
but blasphemy, curses, foul obscenity, and threatened violence, 
in answer to the kindest management. Her conduct was 
horrible past description. Here was a case that scorned 
benevolence and invited force. The philosophy of tender- 
ness seemed at fault, at first, but Mrs. Farnham knew 
human nature better — she wrote to Xew York, learned the 
woman's history, learned that her infant had been taken 
from her, and that she had been convicted upon very uncer- 
tain testimony. She was indeed a profligate, but had some 
wrongs also to revenge upon the world that crushed her. 

Mrs. Farnham, with a mother's instinct, gave this girl 
her own child to nurse — it calmed her fury, convinced her 
reason, and softened her heart. In a moment the ruffian 
wretch shed tears, and submitted to the law of kindness. 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 355 

We saw her one year afterwards ; her cell door was never 
locked upon her. She read " the pleasant pages of London 
and Paris literature in her luxurious hours of leisure," the 
Bible, Episcopalian prayer-book, Walter Scott, Miss Mar- 
tineau, Mrs. B.'s Conversations on Philosophy, and the North 
American, perhaps, occasionally. On the 4th of July, a 
gentleman of New York sent bouquets of flowers to each of 
the seventy women in prison, and one costly and specially 
beautiful one, to be presented by the matron to the most 
deserving. She referred the decision to the free vote of the 
women themselves ; with one dissenting voice only they 
awarded it to that wretched girl, in testimony of their 
regard. Mrs. Farnham approved their choice. And the 
Editors of the North American would have felt the " luxury 
of philanthropy " and understood its policy, too, if they had 
been there to see. 

It is only fair justice, however, to state that some of the 
criminals themselves disapproved the system. One old lady ■ 
of sixty, thought " there ought to be more preaching and less 
lightness of behavior among them young flirts." She knew 
human nature, and hated everybody accordingly, but she 
liked whisky and petty larcenies. The happiness of those 
around her was rudely discordant to her staid principles. 

The Editors are entitled to another authority in confirma- 
tion of their opinion. A good old lady saw Mrs. Farnham 
on a steamboat, and when she learned her name, broke out 
with " That's the woman that lets them nasty abominable 
girls in the penitentiary jump the rope and dance in the 
yard, and sing so that they can be heard clear outside of 
the wall ! It's too bad ; if the jades must sing, why don't 
she make -them sing in to themselves !" 

Xo danger that " the wisdom of centuries will be over- 
turned " universally. There are some specimens of human 



356 THE FOURTH STREET MURDER: 

clay too hard baked to allow M horror of crime " to be oblite- 
rated by the tears of a " sickly sentiment ;" no danger that 
the M reform of the criminal " will ever be their "main object. 7 ' 
But there is no telling what may happen when these bally- 
rocks of conservatism are all dead. 

1843. 



THE FOURTH STREET MURDER— CAPITAL 
PUNISHMENT. 

We need not give the particulars. They are published in 
detail in the dailies, and known to all who take any kind of 
interest in them. The murderer is in prison. His examina- 
tion shows that he is a brutal creature, capable of almost any 
crime. He shows but little sensibility of his own danger, and 
no compunction for his shocking crime. It is said that he 
is one of the wretches which foreign governments are in the 
practice of transporting to our shores from their jails and poor- 
houses, to serve out their time here as paupers or criminals, 
just as they are disposed and qualified. 

The lex talionis party have possession of the case, and he 
must either be hanged or lynched ; and even then the senti- 
ment which demands vengeance will not be half satisfied. It 
is in fact true that a dozen such lives as his could not expiate 
his crime, or settle his account with public justice. But what 
more than killing him can be done, or might be desired, we 
cannot say. A lady (one of a thousand perhaps) insisted to 
us that the punishment of death is not nearly severe enough 
for the case ; we quietly suggested that the unsatisfied bal- 
ance of her indignation might be transferred to his account 
in the next world, and the Judge of the dead requested to 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 35? 

wreak its full measure upon him there, after the utmost pen- 
alty of the law is inflicted upon him here. She seemed 
startled at the thought, and changed the argument from 
revenge to that of the public defence ; but in this aspect 
the case in hand is particularly unmanageable. 

The apprehension of the death penalty did not prevent this 
murder ; this, the most monstrous of its kind, the strongest 
instance in its class, is the very case for which the gallows is 
no prevention. Langfeldt had neither friends nor wealth, 
nor was there any reasonable prospect of concealment or 
escape. Xo conceivable case could more fairly test the pro- 
tective quality of the death punishment. The crime and the 
penalty stood together, as close linked as cause and effect, 
and clear enough for the bluntest intellect that leaves a man 
responsible for his deeds. And just in this case it proved 
utterly worthless. 

Langfeldt is familiar with public executions ; he knows 
nothing of government but its severities. He was born to 
infamy, educated in crime, his whole life has been a warfare 
with the law, and the gallows has ever been the clearest 
probability in his fate. He, a foreigner, a convict, friendless 
and odious, could promise himself no advantage of that ten- 
derness of life which is blamed with favoring these atrocities. 
On the wide earth there was no eye to pity, and no arm to 
rescue him from the death he deserved and dared. Yet the 
frowning gibbet, with all its terrors full in his view, afforded 
no protection, not the least, to his hapless victims. It never 
did, it never will deter a Langfeldt from shedding blood. 
The gallows is a miserable reliance against the brutal wan- 
tonness of all such criminals as this man. 

Upon what proportion of lawless men it operates advan- 
tageously we cannot say. But that it is small we feel 
assured. The cunning and cautious criminal expect3 to 



358 THE FOURTH STREET MURDER! 

evade it; and the man of furious passion gives it no thought 
or heed till the deed is done. The few upon whom it acts 
as a restraining dread, have but little of the character that 
makes men dangerous, and are as likely to be deterred by 
the apprehension of life-long imprisonment. 

The cold-blooded murderer is as unfit to live as he is to 
die. Say he deserves death here, and if you please, eternal 
pain hereafter ; does it follow that it is right and best for us 
to inflict the one in vengeance, any more than to pray and 
labor to involve him in the other ? May we hurry him off 
in unrepented guilt, and so secure his final ruin ? Hatred 
cannot go so far as this without becoming more horrible 
than the crime it seeks to punish. Or should we give him a 
little time for repentance, and then, when justice is appeased 
and guilt atoned for and removed, despatch him? In plain 
words, shall we hang him either into hell or into heaven ! ! 
The first seems too bitter even for an enemy, and the latter 
is not kind enough for a brother, redeemed and sanctified. 

Human tribunals never can measure the absolute guilt of 
crimes; they are not qualified, and they have no right to 
inquire into this quality of wrong-doing. Self-defence belongs 
to every individual in society ; self-defence belongs to the 
aggregate of individuals in a community : revenge belongs 
to neither, it is a sin in both, and as much a wrong to the 
subjects of public as of private hatred. The Heart-searcher 
and Rein-tryer alone is competent to ascertain and discipline 
the guilt of sin. 

Men and communities may and ought to protect them- 
selves against injuries. If this requires life, let them take 
it ; if it does not, the deed is as much a murder as if the 
victim were as innocent as an infant. Confinement for life 
is as complete security against the convicted criminal as the 
scaffold ; and executive clemency is even less likely to be 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 359 

interposed in favor of liberty than of life. And, that it will 
deter others as effectually as the risk of a speedy execution, 
is at least probable enough to authorize the experiment. 
We do not rest our opposition to the death punishment upon 
the ground of the inviolability of life, but because there is 
no sufficient reason for it in civilized societies, fully furnished, 
as they are, with all the means of self-protection and defence, 
and under heavy obligations, besides, to the criminal whose 
provocations and temptations to commit offences are, in 
most cases, chargeable upon the political and social systems 
which claim the right to punish them. 

Until society has done its duty to the poor, the ignorant 
and the profligate, it cannot justly demand the last drop of 
blood from the wretches who violate its laws. 

When the fortunate and unfortunate, the respectable and 
the abandoned, meet where the force of circumstances are 
justly estimated, and the standard of judgment is absolutely 
perfect, we will know why God requires mercy rather than 
sacrifice, and why is it fitter for us to forgive than to revenge 
our wrongs. 

We plead for the life of the criminal because we doubt 
both the propriety and policy of destroying it, and especially, 
because we believe that additional security would be given 
to the community, by the sentiment that, no cause whatever 
can justify the shedding of human blood for crimes commit- 
ted against either communities or individuals. 

1848. 



RELIGIOUS. 



RELIGIOUS. 



THE SABBATH. 

The word Sabbath, in the Hebrew language, signifies rest, 
or cessation, and is, strictly, the name of the institution. 
Sunday is the name of the day adopted, by the majority of 
Christians, for its observance. The ancient Greeks and 
Romans had no division of time properly answering to our 
weeks. The former divided the month into three decades of 
days ; the latter had their nundince, or market days, occurring 
every ninth day; but neither of these had either the refer- 
ences or uses of the week and the Sabbath. But the Egyp- 
tians and the oriental nations, in the still more ancient times, 
had a week of seven days. It is believed that the Romans 
adopted the hebdomadal division about the beginning of the 
third century after Christ. They named the days after the 
planets or heathen gods. It is worthy of notice also that 
our names for the days had a similar origin, as will be seen by 
traciug their Saxon derivation. Pritchard quotes Bosman for 
the fact that the Karabari, and several other tribes of Western 
Africa, have been long acquainted with the division of time 
into weeks, and each day of the seven has its proper name 
in their language. Their Sabbath falls on our Tuesday, 
except at Ante, bordering upon the Mohammedans, where 
it agrees with theirs in being fixed upon Friday. Among 
these barbarians, fishing only is prohibited upon their Sab- 

16 



362 THE SABBATH. 

bath ; in respect to other occupations they make no differ- 
ence. 

The division of time into periods of seven days among 
nations, not governed by our sacred books, or not indebted 
to Moses for the sabbatical institution, may be accounted 
for, perhaps, by the fact that it is a natural quartering of 
the lunar or apparent month, and the nearest that can be 
effected without breaking a solar day into fractions for the 
purpose. That is, if the lunar month is divided in half, and 
again into halves of that half, measured by whole days, 
which would be natural enough among barbarous people, 
seven days are the result, and so the week would occur in 
their computations of time. 

There is another natural measurement of time by weeks, 
which we will take the opportunity briefly to exhibit, 
without designing now to offer all the instances which we - 
think support it, or to exhaust the argument on which it 
rests. 

The proposition which we submit is, that the weekly period 
and the rest-day are well founded in the natural constitution 
of man, and might even be inferred from it; or, more specific- 
ally to present the point now in hand, there is a physiological 
reason for such a period and such an institution — a hebdoma- 
dal circle in the movements of the human organization — a 
cycle of actions which complete their round in seven days, and 
this circuit of movements is specially adapted to our week 
and rest-day. 

Hippocrates, who lived six hundred years before Christ, 
and in a country which had not the weekly apportionment 
of time to suggest his idea, taught that fevers changed for 
the better or worse on the seventh, fourteenth and twenty- 
first days. The highest authorities in medicine, for ages, 
recerred and endorsed this opinion. In modern times, by 



THE SABBATH. 363 

the interpolations of an humble race of physicians, the critical 
days of fever were made to embrace other minor periods of 
marked changes, until the whole twenty-one were filled up, 
and the doctrine fell into disrepute — a misfortune that scienti- 
fic truths often suffer by the improvements of decidedly unin- 
spired men. 

There is, beside the septenary period with which the true 
critical days- correspond, a clear diurnal movement in the 
system, very well marked in health, and often exhibiting its 
effects in disease; as an ephemeral fever, the quotidian, ter- 
tian, and quartian ague — the first exhausting itself in one 
day; the latter recurring at intervals of one, two, and three 
days. Changes in the progress of fevers at these properly 
diurnal periods have been confounded with the septenary 
movement, and, of course, obscured its manifestation. More- 
over, the vigorous remedial treatment of modern times, 
doubtless, interrupts the more natural progress of febrile 
phenomena, and further contributes to conceal and confuse 
the facts upon which the old doctrine of crisis rests. 

Nevertheless, it is well supported by our most distinguished 
authorities. Hosack and Dickson of New York, and Eberle 
and Wood of Philadelphia, are clear in their adhesion to it ; 
and one of the sects of modern medicine makes that obvious 
periodicity, of which this is one of the instances, the basis of 
its distinctive theory and practice. Among the great names 
of foreign countries, whose observations have confirmed the 
doctrine as it was taught by Hippocrates, we may mention 
Cleghorn, who practised on the shores of the Mediterranean; 
Balfour, in the East Indies; and Jackson, in the "West 
Indies. 

A striking fact, at once clear and unembarrassed, deserves 
especial regard, to wit: the tendency of miasmatic fevers to 
return after being checked, at the end of the first, second, 



364 THE SABBATH. 

and third week— most frequently at tie end of the second. 
Professor Wood, of the University of Pennsylvania, who has 
no theory to support by the observation, says "this tendency 
is quite inexplicable in the present state of our knowledge." 
Practitioners, we know, who reside in the middle counties of 
Pennsylvania, continue the use of quinine and bark till the 
eighth day after the last paroxysm, or resume it the day 
before the seventh, to meet the known liability to relapse at 
the septenary period. Doctor Samuel Dickson, formerly of 
Charleston, and recently of the New York University, says : 
"The septenary period is almost as well marked as the diur- 
nal." Again: "The combined influence of the diurnal and 
septenary revolutions, liable, perhaps, to other complications 
more obscure in their nature, will account for all the types 
of fever, and all the phenomena of periodical repetitions of 
diseases, as well as of crises, or the agency of critical days." 
Speaking of the latent period of fever, or the time intervening 
between exposure to marsh effluvia and the development of 
the disease, he says : "This period is known to be under the 
influence of the ordinary revolutions which give periodicity 
to disease in general. The apparent influence upon it of the 
septenary revolution, is familiarly noticed in our climate 
(South Carolina), where the opportunities for observation 
are unfortunately distinct and frequent. Our 'Country 
Fever' is expected to invade on or about the 1th or 14th 
day, and if the 21st passes without an attack, most persons 
consider themselves entirely safe." 

The small pox and vaccine disease, and several others which 
run their course unaffected by treatment, in a very marked 
manner, show this seven-day movement of the system ; and 
there are, besides, a host of observations which help to esta- 
blish it as a law of the human constitution. In the healthy 
state, the reproductive functions are singularly well marked, 



THE SABBATH. 365 

not by periods of single weeks, but by exactly integral mul- 
tiples of them. Attention to this point will abundantly sus- 
tain this assertion. Diseased manifestations are the better 
indexes, because they exaggerate the natural movements in 
the human system, and the more distinctly proclaim them ; 
but the facts of health are also very conclusive. 

Let us look a little more closely at the general law of 
periodicity as it rules the human organism, for the help and 
direction that its specialities afford to our inquiry: 

Alternate action and repose, in the actions of animal life, 
is a general law. The diurnal revolution is well understood. 
The complete rest of all the functions of relative life, and the 
comparative abatement of activity in the vital organs, once 
in twenty-four hours, is a plain necessity of our existence. 
This law obtains even in vegetable life. And it is a perti- 
nent remark that, wherever the instincts of animals and plants 
absolutely rule the actions of the being, the law isnpunctually 
obeyed. The simple day and night revolution of animal and 
vegetable life suffices for their constitutions. The external 
senses, the muscles of locomotion, and the nerves, which co- 
operate in their activities, are often held to their objects and 
exerted in their offices for hours together, without the least 
intermission, for they are under the direction of the will; but 
they obtain a complete release during sleep, and all the res- 
toration which they ^ require. The animal portion of man, 
and the entire nature of birds and beasts, living according 
to nature's free impulses, are sure of their daily repose, and 
guarded, besides, by the feeling of fatigue, which restrains 
abuse, need no Sabbath for periodical recuperation. But the 
organs of thought and feeling are not so well protected. 
They are usually more severely tasked, their weariness is less 
distinctly felt and understood, and their pleasures and excite- 
ments are more impulsive. The faculties employed in the 



366 THE SABBATH. 

business atocations of life, embracing literary as well as com- 
mercial and industrial pursuits, and the passions involved in 
their activities, are in all active temperaments burdened 
every day, quite beyond the moderation consistent with 
health. The merely animal functions of the frame take bet- 
ter care of themselves than these higher and freer faculties 
of our nature usually do. Moreover, the excesses and dis- 
eases of those organs which are the material instruments of 
mind, -do not generally originate in themselves, but in the 
irregular excitation which they suffer from the mental and 
passional powers. It is these master-wheels in the machinery 
of phrenic life that drive the subordinate activities of the 
frame into abuse. It is, therefore, for these controlling for- 
ces of the mind that regulating and restraining checks are 
specially required. Day after day their tyranny tasks the 
inferior powers to exhaustion, which otherwise would take 
care of themselves, as they do in the animal kingdom; nor 
do they always rest even in the sleep of their wearied instru- 
ments ; dreams prolong their vigils, and they lie waiting and 
watching the first waking motions of the day-laborers in their 
service, to drive them yawning to their endless work. 

It is the engagements which we call the business of our 
lives which transcend their proper limits, and break the 
natural balance of healthy moderation. It is these, there- 
fore, that need a regularly recurring rest-day. It is too 
much that every waking hour shall be given to our common 
work — that every day of our lives shall be crowded with our 
ordinary anxieties of thought and feeling. All this should 
be wholly intermitted at regular returns, adapted to our 
constitution, and calculated to obviate the evils of artificial 
life. The fourth commandment, it seems to us, answers 
exactly to this necessity: " Six days shalt thou labor and do 
all thy work. * * On the seventh day thou shalt do no 



THE SABBATH. 36? 

manner of work." It does not, in terms, enjoin public wor- 
ship; perhaps it does not imply it as a universal requisition; 
and our municipal laws are all the more just and right that 
in this they very exactly correspond. They forbid ordinary 
labor, but they do not compel worship or any religious 
observances. 

The necessity for a rest-day is so universally admitted 
that it need not be pressed. It is required only that it 
should be more accurately understood, and it is to this point 
that our remarks are specially addressed. Our thought is, 
that only those faculties which are usually overstrained, and 
the instruments which they employ in their service, need the 
rest of the weekly Sabbath. Those parts of the body which, 
under the compulsion of business, get insufficient exercise 
through the week, even require such opportunity as the rest- 
day may consistently be made to afford them. " The Sabbath 
was made for man, not man for the Sabbath." 

The seven-day periodic movement in the human system, 
conspicuously shown in disease, and not less certain, though 
less obvious in health, indicates one day in seven as the 
appropriate portion of time to be set apart for the renewal 
of the animal vigor wasted by the ordinary labors of our life. 
The intellectual powers, when they have done their six days' 
common work, require this relief. The full freedom and force 
of heart and mind cannot be preserved unless the dominant 
interests of ordinary pursuits are resolutely thrust aside at 
frequent intervals, and the powers, absorbed by them, are 
relieved by periodic checks. 

The higher and nobler faculties need the day also for dis- 
cipline and development; and all these necessary and benefi- 
cent objects are attained, in the happiest harmony with the 
natural laws, by the proper and well-adapted observance of 



368 THE SABBATH. 

the day which Christianity has established among us. It 
should therefore be accepted. 

It is not necessary to the claims of a revealed or superna- 
tural institution that it should be a novelty in human expe- 
rience, or incapable of discovery by natural reason, or a 
violation of natural law. It is enough that it is right, and 
the authentication of such right is well worthy of the divine 
interposition. Indeed, the entire code of Christianity is 
declared by Bishop Butler to be but a republication of the 
natural laws of morality in their primitive truth and purity. 
The doctrines and ordinances of a revelation are even corro- 
borated by their accordance with reason and nature, more 
especially, when such teachings are delivered in a dark and 
corrupt age. 

Thus far, we have spoken of the Sabbath chiefly as a day 
of rest for those functions of the frame and mind whidh con- 
stitutionally or accidentally require it, and we have admitted, 
also, that it may be a day of exercise for those which may 
thus most beneficially employ it. 

On this ground we hold that moral and spiritual culture, 
public or private, or both, as the case requires, should be 
specially attended to on the sacred day. This part of our 
nature needs such culture, certainly, and there is great 
advantage in making it exclusively the active business of the 
day, for the reason of its own high necessity, and for the 
additional reason that we cannot otherwise effectually throw 
the working faculties out of gear. The mind will not submit 
to absolute inactivity, and if not forced into a new track, it 
will obstinately pursue the old one, and so the over-worked 
week-day faculties will be cheated of their rest. 

It does not meet the case to answer that every day is holy, 
and that religion and morality should rule our whole life. 



THE SABBATH. 3G9 

These faculties demand a special and exclusive cultivation. 
There ought to be a whole day in the week kept holy to God 
and Humanity. Not only should the hurry and solicitude 
of business be suspended for the health of the powers which 
it burdens, not only should there be a break in the headlong 
current of mercenary speculation — a dyke to check the ruth- 
less tide of selfishness — a day for clean clothes and fresh air 
— an interval of peace in the battle of life — but, the purest 
and highest sentiments which connect us with the spirits 
above and around us, in the holiest and most beneficent 
relations, ask such opportunity for fitting development; and 
we say that a sabbath should be devoted to all these resto- 
rative and educational uses. It is just because one day, at 
least, in seven, is not given to morals and religion, that their 
science is less understood in the present age than any other 
matter of human concern. 

We do not postulate the inspiration of Moses. Few per- 
sons know what they mean by the word, or how to govern 
.their own thoughts and conduct by- their notion of it ; and 
in such discussions as this, it more frequently raises a war 
of words than leads to any useful conclusions. We believe 
it for ourselves in a very useful way; and we believe, further, 
that all the positive institutions of the Old Testament system 
will be found, upon candid and enlightened investigation, to 
be in accordance with natural law, though much modified by 
the exigencies of the times and people to whom they were 
given. An over-ruling idea with us is, that all the laws of 
God are made for the benefit of their subjects — that he does 
not give us wants and deny their healthy gratification — that 
he does not confer powers and forbid their legitimate activity 
— in a word, that he did not bestow life, and then take back 
one-seventh of it arbitrarily for his own purposes, to the 
injury or deprivation of his creatures. We look, therefore, 

16* 



370 THE BIBLE QUESTION. 

for the beneficial reason of commandments imposed in his 
name; and when we find such utilities as the rest-day 
embraces, we have no doubt of the obligation, as we have 
none of the resulting benefit. 

Religion and morals, we are aware, are separate and dis- 
tinct things. They are often divorced; as often, unhappily, 
by the devout as by the profane. Pious people often over- 
strain the sanctification of the Sabbath, from an earnest fear 
of injurious consequences that might follow a reasonable 
relaxation of the Jewish Sabbath's severities. Our appre- 
hension is, that divine service is not human sacrifice, in any 
technical sense, under the Christian system, and that the 
observance of the sacred day is put within the devout dis- 
cretion of religious men, restrained by all that cautious con- 
sideration which is due to the general well-being of their 
neighbors; but what we write is intended rather for the use 
of those who reason so well that, though they are not con- 
stitutionally defective in reverence, are yet without the 
caution which it so usefully supplies to ardent minds. The 
freedom of the soul is even more precious than the truth 
itself; but boys do not know everything, and brains, like 
cats' eyes, however keen, are none the worse for the help of 
the feelers in dark corners. 



THE BIBLE QUESTION. 

iso book, since the introduction of Christianity, has had 
a tithe of the influence upon the opinions and conduct of 
the world, that is justly credited to the Bible. Since the 
Christian epoch, all private and public economy, all institu- 



THE BIBLE QUESTION. 37] 

tions, domestic and civil, all international relations, and the 
whole range of the natural sciences, have been changed. 
The progress of the race in this period is so great and so 
varied, that conception fails to grasp it with adequate com- 
pleteness and clearness. Nothing in recorded miracles is so 
wonderful as the difference between the facts of the world's 
life to-day and eighteen hundred years ago. Yet it is true 
that, at every advanced stage of all this change, Christianity 
was still nobler in sentiment and richer in practical good 
than the highest actual realization ; and it is just as true 
that it is still as really in advance of all present attainment. 
Nay, the distance increases as the world advances, just as 
the view expands and the horizon recedes, to one ascending 
a height. Whoever applies the New Testament morality in 
the regulation of his affections and the conduct of his life, 
will find its correspondence and adaptation to his noblest 
powers and worthiest impulses. The system itself allows 
and authorizes its receivers to submit it to the test of such 
experience, and consents to be judged by the consequences 
of its adoption. But it does not submit its claim upon the 
faith of men to any of the thousand other modes of scrutiny 
which an indifferent criticism may choose to apply to it. 

St. Paul says, emphatically, that " the carnal mind is 
enmity against God ; for it is not subject to the law of God, 
neither indeed can be." Again, he says, " the natural man 
receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God ; for they are 
foolishness to him ; neither can he know them, because they 
are spiritually discerned." St. John says the same thing : 
" The light shineth in darkness, and the darkness compre- 
bendeth it not." Jesus told the Pharisees that they heard 
uot his words, because they were not of God. To his disci- 
ples he said — " Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall 
make you free." Ho did not say they knew it in advance 



372 THE BIBLE QUESTION. 

of their acceptance, or in the attitude of resistance 
On the contrary, he declares, "If any man will do His 
(God's) will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of 
God." 

In these grand fundamental propositions the philosophy 
of the gospel system is found, so far as concerns the investi- 
gation of its truth and authenticity. It comes to men with 
the distinct assertion of their incompetency to judge its 
claims by any maxims or standards which they have, inde- 
pendently of it ; and all criticism, separate from acceptance 
and submission, it repudiates. Not one of its teachers ever 
perpetrated so gross a blunder in logic as to concede the 
competency of ignorance, error and unbelief, to judge the 
claims of inspiration. The Book never argues the existence 
of God, or the possibility and consistency of supernatural 
communications from him. If it did it must begin by admit- 
ting its own revelations unnecessary. The man that already 
knows what can and what cannot be, does not need to be 
told what is. If he already knows what is true and what is 
false, the proposed revelation is merely impertinent. 

If any one answers that, " Imposture may take the same 
ground," he deserves to be answered that, no imposture is 
quite so stupid as to talk of measuring a new and higher 
truth by a known one that is worn out of form or fitness for 
the use which the revelation offers to supply. That absurdity 
is the peculiar distinction of skeptical rationalism. 

But Christianity is consistent throughout on this point. 
It treats its disciples just as it does its enemies. Jesus 
spoke in parables to the people because it was not given to 
them to understand the mysteries of the Kingdom ; but he 
also told the twelve, in his last discourse, " I have yet many 
things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now." 
Paul tells the disciples in Corinth, " I have fed you with 



THE BIBLE QUESTION. 373 

milk, and not with meat ; for hitherto ye were not able to 
bear it, neither yet now are ye able." 

Thus, it is not the policy of the gospel even to propose its 
doctrines to incapable subjects, much less, submit them to an 
incompetent criticism, and invite its decision. 

It is very clear that communication depends upon recep- 
tivity ; that a pint bottle will not receive a quart of liquor ; 
and that men are judges of truth and beauty, in art, nature, 
morals and religion, only in the proportion that they have 
the correspondent ideas and feelings in themselves, or, accord- 
ing to the maxim of Christ, " to him that hath shall be given," 
for he only can receive ; and " from him that hath not shall 
be taken away, even that which he hath," because he does 
not availably hold it. 

When a controversialist, therefore, says this or that decla- 
ration of principles — this or that revelation of mysteries, 
is contrary to the nature and attributes of God, it still 
remains to be ascertained whether he knows God ; and that 
is to be settled by his own resemblance or approach, to the 
Divine. 

Some men reject the book, because the supernatural, with 
which it abounds, is impossible ; that is, improbable to them. 
They reveal themselves only ; and that does not affect either 
the truth or the fact of its revelation. The standard of 
truth, in anything, is the judgment of the highest endowed 
in that thing ; whether it be poetry, music, morals, or reason. 
Negation by the defective is nothing. He is not the wisest 
man who believes least, for, believing least, he knows least 
that is positive and sure. No man is so empty as the. skep- 
tic, for he, of all men, knows least of anything that is certain 
and reliable, even by his own showing ; and he cannot dis- 
prove anything of all the store that belongs to the man of 
faith. When a man says, " I have eyes, and I do not see 



374 THE BIBLE QUESTION. 

that beauty which you adore," he has only proved that he 
does not see the beauty. If I see it, my testimony is evidence, 
because it affirms my belief and knowledge. His is not 
evidence, because it only asserts his ignorance negatively. 

The man that believes all which his faculties require and 
can discover, has a full soul, and a completed existence. 
His opposite, with all his sharpness, is only a beggared man, 
whose great boast is, that he doubts everything, and then 
doubts his own doubts, and, upon the whole, is always too 
hard for himself. 

But the authenticity of the Sacred Scriptures, and the 
authority of all their recorded examples, and the obligation 
of all the precepts which they impose, is a mixed question, 
and usually not a little confused in ordinary discussion. The 
book throughout may be as true as it claims to be ; yet, every 
fact and every word therein written may not be sacred and 
authoritative to any man now living ; nay, a great deal may 
be, and is, by its own terms, or by just construction, the very 
contrary. Job is rebuked for his complaint against the jus- 
tice of the providence which had afflicted him, and confesses 
that he had uttered that which he understood not ; things 
too wonderful for him, which he knew not. " Wherefore," 
says he, "I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." 
David says, " I acknowledge my transgressions ; and my sin 
is ever before me." Are the Scriptures and the religion 
they teach, therefore, responsible for every word uttered by 
the one, or every deed done by the other, even though it is 
said, in general terms, of the former, that he had spoken of 
the Lord that which is right ; and of the latter, that his 
heart was perfect with the Lord ? 

The book, however, does not leave us without a perfect 
example of life, as well as an absolute standard of doctrine 
and belief. Jesus said to his adversaries, " Which of you 



THE BIBLE QUESTION. 3^5 

couvlnceth me of sin ? " And his own witnesses say that he 
was " holy, harmless, undented, separate from sinners, and 
made higher than the heavens ; " that he was "the bright- 
ness of the Father's glory, and the express image of his 
person." His teachings and example are given us without 
reservations. St. Paul frankly says, " Xot as though I had 
already attained, either were already perfect ; but I follow 
after, if that I may apprehend that for which I am appre- 
hended of Christ Jesus ; " and elsewhere, " as we said before, 
so say I now again, if any man preacheth any other gospel 
unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed ; " 
and, still more emphatically, " though we, or an angel from 
heaven, preach any other gospel to you, let him be accursed.' 7 
The demand of the gospel is, " Take up your cross, and fol- 
low Christ." He is " the way, the truth, and the life ; " 
and " there is no other name under heaven given among men, 
whereby we must be saved." And " He is made unto us 
wisdom, and righteousness,^ and sanctification, and redemp- 
tion," by so conforming our lives to his, that we may be said 
to pat off the old man, which is corrupt, and to "put on 
Christ." 

Discussions about the inspiration of the book are not coun- 
tenanced, neither are investigations of its historical, scientific, 
or political accuracy, encouraged. They are nothing to the 
purpose. Its religion ^proposes to reform the life, and through 
that j to enlighten the understanding in the things which really 
concern our highest interests. If any man appeals to it for 
justification of his opinions or his deeds, he is to be answered 
that "the Gospel is hidden to them that are lost ;" that it 
is not a directory for the business and ambition of the world- 
ling ; that the unstable and unlearned only wrest the Scrip- 
tures to their own destruction, when they employ them merely 
as they would the provisions of the civil law, or those of a 



3T6 THE BIBLE QUESTION. 

code of morals, for the casual endorsement of specific acts, 
while the life is utterly estranged from their spirit and 
government. If Abraham and David sinned in their private 
lives, or abused their official powers, in any instance, it is to 
be understood that the shortcomings of saints are no justifi- 
cation for the transgressions of sinners. And, on the other 
hand, if anyone impugns the system which did not quite 
save its best disciples from error, he is drawing the unwar- 
rantable conclusion, that there can be no truth where there 
is any mistake or misadventure. 

Moreover, the Scriptures do not ask the belief of the head, 
but of the heart ; and that is given only by becoming in act 
and fact what they enjoin. Men must be transformed by the 
renewing of their minds, to receive the religion of Jesus ; 
and all mere speculation about it is purely irrelevant, if not 
worse. The apostle, very likely, had these fruitless wrang- 
lings in his thought, when he told Timothy to keep that which 
was committed to his trust, avoiding profane and vain bab- 
blings, and oppositions of science, falsely so called. The pro- 
mise of Christ, and the teachings of a sound mental philosophy, 
agree that he, and he alone, who doeth the will of the Father, 
shall know the doctrine whether it be of God. There is no 
reason, either of justice or mercy, why any one else should 
know the truth ; for its only use is to be obeyed, and the 
disobedient are as well without light, as without goodness. 
There is a fixed necessity that truth and good, and error and 
evil, shall go together, here and hereafter. Correct opinions 
and a bad life are so sorry an absurdity, that no one need 
have any solicitude for such soundness of belief, nor fear any 
sort of evil from the lack of it, 

The inspiration of prophets, apostles, and even that of 
heroes and poets — of the great and good of every faith and 
sphere of God's service — stands on the same ground. Who- 



ECCLESIASTES. 377 

ever doubts it, could not understand or receive it to any good 
purpose, no matter how it might be proved. They must 
grow up into the light ; it will never come down to them. 
There is light to the seeing, none to the blind. So we settle 
the Bible question for ourselves. Others, also, will settle it 
according to the life that is in them. 



ECCLESIASTES. 

The freedom of the tongue and the liberty of the press 
are getting a demonstration just now, in the matter of popu- 
lar lectures and their newspaper reports, to such an extent 
that it must have decided consequences some day soon. I 
think it concerns the pulpit not a little. Not long since, the 
clergy held the office of oral instructors of the people, almost 
exclusively. They limit their prelections to religious doc- 
trines and worship, which the volunteer corps of lay teachers 
usually avoid, but both parties meet congregations consist- 
ing of nearly the same individuals, and the points of corres- 
pondence are numerous enough to induce comparison and 
criticism, notwithstanding the preserved differences of topics 
and treatment. This is the case with Protestant preaching 
especially. As our religious exercises are usually conducted, 
there is very little of worship proper in them. The prayer 
is by the clergyman, the music chiefly by the choir, the dis- 
course occupying two-thirds of the time, and the people are m 
effect the audience, almost as much as at a scientific or lite- 
rary lecture. They go to hear, and the duty of the place is 
pretty well performed if they listen decorously to the sermon. 
Now, whatever else there might be, or ought to be, in what 
we term divine service, it results in a pretty close resent- 



378 



ECCLESIASTES. - 



blance to the better style of those popular meetings for 
merely intellectual entertainment, which are coming into 
vogue so extensively. The professional clergy and church- 
going must be affected by it. 

The practice of muting public teaching with public wor- 
ship, may have authority in its use and propriety, but I 
believe it has no example in the practice of Christ, or of his 
immediate apostles and evangelists. There is no instance, 
and there is no notice, in the New Testament, of a religious 
service or exercise in which worship and text-preaching, or 
any form of didactic discourse, were combined. This is 
worthy of notice. The Catholic and English Episcopal 
churches seem to have recognized the difference, and pro- 
vided for their severance ; both of them make a large part 
of the sanctuary service consist of prayer, penitence and 
adoration, and both are able by their forms to dispense with 
pulpit discourses in their principal solemnities. But the 
dissenting churches have a very different drift and policy, 
and the older establishments usually conform to the later 
fashion, perhaps from a necessity which arises out of the 
great controversy which has brought their respective creeds 
into debate. 

From one cause or another, the pulpit has become among 
us a sort of popular forum ; enough like that of ancient 
Rome to bring it within the jurisdiction of public opinion, 
and subject it to comparison and criticism, in common with 
the ordinary forms of lay teaching. 

Am I right in the belief that we remember less of the 
thousand sermons which we hear, than of anything else to 
which we give our attention in a similar way ? Am I right 
in the opinion that preaching is regarded with less earnest- 
ness and interest than any other kind of public discourses ? 
What did Dr. Beecher mean by saying that the Devil 



ECCLESIASTES. 379 

appears to hold a mortgage upon the educated mind of the 
country? The pulpit, I suppose, must suffer or improve 
greatly under the influence of the new method, which is now 
growing into a system. In either case, it must experience 
such modification as deserves the attention of all concerned. 
The lecturers have advantages of the clergy in this rivalry, 
which must be looked to. The lecturer has all the leisure 
of the year for the preparation of half a dozen addresses ; 
he has, besides, the chance and choice of his best points, and 
may be always strong and fresh. An itinerant ministry has 
these advantages in a good degree, also ; but the pastors of 
all our churches in the thickly settled communities are sta- 
tionary ; and two sermons a week, with a multitude of calls 
for addresses upon the benevolent, missionary, and literary 
movements of the times, amount to a heavier draft upon 
them than they can creditably answer. Devotional feeling 
and sacred associations afford them some protection ; but 
they will be compared, nevertheless, in pitch, power and 
interest, with the best of their rivals, wherever the new 
usage obtains. 

They have taught us to look for the matter and manner 
of eloquent performances. And they must fall under the 
judgments of the rule. 

There is the whole of Sunday, one day of the week, allot- 
ted to them, and they must either bring us back to unmixed 
worship in our churches, in which they have no rivalry of 
office, or they must fill up the time with such occupation as 
it may be the fashion to demand, or, they must fall behind 
the requirements of the times. The magnificence of church 
buildings, the parade of dress, and the relief of idleness, will 
come in time to contrast badly with pure devotion on the 
one hand, and elegant literary entertainment on the other. 
The Catholic method seems best adjusted to the exigency, and 



380 



ECO' ESIASTES. 



its recent successes are in this matter very instructive. There 
is nothing in the spirit of the age, nothing in modern insti- 
tutions, in its favor ; but Protestantism is losing its fitness 
to the progress which it belongs to and depends upon. 

The essence of Catholicism is authority ; the spirit which 
it demands is reverence. Protestantism is but another 
name for liberty ; .and, by its own terms, it must earn all 
the respect it gets. There is no divine right in it ; it is 
only a candidate for popular favor. It does not rely upon 
an ancient title, but claims, by improvement-right, and 
is always arguing its claims — it must therefore argue them 
well, or lose the verdict. The abuses of Mother Church did 
well during the insurrectionary stage of reformation ; but 
for the fixed stage of positive organization, the new church 
must be adapted. The time has come that established 
republicanism wants a religion, and that of the age of rebel- 
lion will no longer answer the requirement. Let our clergy 
look to it. Popular revolution now runs back into arbitrary 
authority with portentous facility. The separation of 
Church and State does not work well for Government, 
where at the same time religion is divorced from politics. 
In Southern Europe (below the 50th degree of north lati- 
tude), the mischief has its power in the character of the peo- 
ple, perhaps ; but even Anglo-Saxondom, on neither side 
of the Atlantic, will bear a religion which rests upon opin- 
ion, and at the same time falls below the advanced ideas of 
that opinion. Our pulpits ought not to stand by quietly, 
much less consentingly, while the obligations of the " Higher 
Law " are derided by men in authority. Their function is 
reformation, not conservatism ; and if they miss their use 
they must lose their place. The Protestant religion was 
not made for submission to authorities, but for the ministry 
of freedom The Catholic Church may well hold by the old 



ECCLESIASTES. 381 

martyrs while slie is making new ones ; but the priesthood 
of private judgment and progressive freedom must not resist 
the very spirit of its calling. The Church of the Cruci- 
fixion stands upon its memories ; but the Church of the 
Resurrection must address itself to our hopes, or it has no 
appropriate function. 

Protestantism, from the first, opened its pulpit for the 
propagation of liberal opinions in government, learning and 
morals ; when it loses this drift, it is beginning to die. 
When it allows political legislation to decide all questions 
of social duty, it sinks from a worthy priesthood into a ser- 
vile police. Aspiration looks ever upward and forward ; 
and if the Church crouches to the State, the uprising 
masses must look, not to the Church, but away from her to 
God. 

I write these words under a painful conviction that we 
cannot hope for efficient interposition, by the clergy of this 
country, for the restraint of injustice in our foreign and 
domestic government, just now becoming more critical than 
ever before; we could not get their help for such vindication 
as became us of the laws of nations, when Europe was in her 
struggle for popular liberty, and we cannot count upon their 
resistance, when we shall take the attitude of aggressors 
ourselves. 

Anglo-Saxondom will struggle long and bravely before it 
will consent to the formal reunion of Church and State ; but 
the Germanic blood is religious as well as metaphysical, and 
will not consent to banish God entirely out of the civil Gov- 
ernment. The best of our battles for liberty were fought 
while religion was part of the civil constitution of England 
and of these colonies. It happened just then that the church 
had the idea of the age, and served it well. Since then we 
have been killing Indians, extending black slavery, and con- 



382 KCCLESIASTES. 

quering our neighbor's territory, until it has become our 
manifest destiny to spread and corrupt until we split. 

Our clergy must take this matter to heart; they must 
recollect that they are not the successors of the Apostles, 
but the ministers of the people ; and that when a mere 
hierarchy is wanted, the old one has the better right, and 
the better chance too, as all current changes seem to indi- 
cate. Preaching against Catholicism will not any longer 
serve the purpose; they have been losing by that game ever 
since the controversy between Hughes and Brackenridge. 
The revival of Romanism began in this country at that 
time. They must do something which the age requires, in 
all questions of national and economical conduct; that is, 
they must answer the uses of the times; they must make us 
better; they must begin to suffer again. 

A Christian ministry without persecution for righteousness' 
sake, without martyrdom in some form, is an absurdity; they 
must take up^ their cross, they must oppose the evil in the 
world, and carry the marks of the conflict.- They must not 
be calling other people infidels, but they must expose them- 
selves to all manner of evil speaking for Christ's sake, or they 
are none of his, and of no use to us. If the world were 
converted, and the Millenium had already come, they might 
be at once popular and worthy; but until then, those that the 
world loves are its own. The nation is in imminent peril of 
wars of ambition and oppression, with all their crimes, suf- 
ferings, and horrors. The religion of peace and the system 
of righteousness ought to have something to say to that; 
or, one way or another, the blood so shed will be required 
at the hands of those watchmen who give not the alarm. 

The uppermost thought in my mind is the present peril 
and prospective ruin of the church of the country, the 
church twin-born with civil liberty. I think of it despair- 
ingly ; would it were otherwise. 



THE FAITH OF C -E S A R ' S HOUSEHOLD 383 



THE FAITH OF CESAR'S HOUSEHOLD. 

" A Christian statesman is the glory of Ms age," says Mr. 
Tenable in a speech lately delivered in the House of Repre- 
sentatives. Some years ago, Mr. Clay offered a resolution 
in the Senate, calling upon the President to appoint a day 
of fasting, humiliation, and prayer, to avert, or mitigate, or 
sanctify, the impending visitation of the Asiatic cholera; he 
said, among other things, "I am not a Christian; I hope I 
shall be before I die." (He was about sixty years of age 
at the time.) He said, in the same speech, "it is natural to 
turn to God, when there is no help from man." 

Xow, what is a Christian statesman ? and how is he the 
glory of his age? Is he a Christian statesman, who, when 
his statesmanship is finished and his life just closing, says, 
H I trust in the atonement of the Saviour of men, as the 
ground of my acceptance and my hope of salvation;" adding, 
"my faith is feeble, but I hope in His mercy and trust in His 
promises ?" Is it the age or the religion of the age that is 
glorified by the dying submission of a great man! Surely it 
is not the statesman, but the man, that dies; and if his own 
notion of " salvation" is that it is something future, something 
after death — that a man is not saved from his sins in this life, 
from their guilt, power, and practice, but from their proper 
consequences in the next life — how is his Christianity the 
glory of his age ? Is it not in fact, as well as in his own 
opinion, only his own escape, his own refuge, from the 
retributions of divine justice? Religion may boast the 
honor of a disciple distinguished in the world's opinion, if it 
needs an honorable endorsement ! and such endorsement 
may help to make a similar profession easy to those who 
seek the honor which cometh from man; but how else a 



384 THE FAITH OF C£SAR ? S HOUSEHOLD. 

feeble faith, which in its nature is no more than a sentiment, 
excited too late to be a practice in any of the rectitudes 
demanded by Christianity — rather for their social uses than 
for their religious truth — how else a reform at three score 
and ten can be a glory, or boast, or benefit, is not all 
apparent. 

Mr. Underwood, too, says: " The lessons of His Providence 
remind us that we have higher duties to fulfil and graver 
responsibilities to encounter, than those that meet us here, 
when we lay our hands upon His holy word, and invoke His 
holy name, promising to be faithful to that Constitution 
which He gave us in His mercy, and will withdraw only in the 
hour of our own blindness and disobedience, and of His own 
wrath." Is this true? Is religion indeed thus separated 
from our duty to our neighbor ? Are its obligations toward 
man justly ranked so far below the homage which it exacts 
toward God ? Are the submissions of exhaustion, and the 
solicitude of a dying man for his own salvation, an acceptable 
substitute for righteousness of life, or an atonement for prac- 
tical delinquency? 

The Christianity of the age is bound in duty and honor 
to repudiate such report of its requirements; it is concerned 
to insist upon its place and action in the every-day duties of 
life, especially in those which relate to the largest and most 
permanent interests of society. Religion must not permit 
itself to be changed from a directory for business into a policy 
of insurance, and so to be transferred from the concerns of 
time to the speculations of eternity. The Greatest Teacher 
employed every conceivable method to impress the eminently 
practical character of the religion which He established. Look 
at His Sermon on the Mount, which is a compendium of all His 
teachings What warranty does it afford for exalting worship 
and faith toward God above love and service to man ? See, 



THE FAITH OF C M S A R ; S HOUSEHOLD. 385 

too, how every parable of His corroborates the morality rather 
than the doctrines of His system; and especially when He lifts 
the curtain of the spirit world, and displays the principles and 
process of the final judgment; is there a word there that coun- 
tenances the neglect or violation of duty to man, as a less 
matter than a sentimental faith in the atonement? It is 
true, or it is not true, that we shall be judged, every man 
according to his deeds done in the body; that we shall reap 
that which we have sown ; and, that the cry of "Lord, Lord l n 
will not answer when the question is, what improvement we 
have actually made of our talents? Do the Scriptures 
authorize the magnifying of the Divine mercy at the expense 
of human duty, or allow that, flattering the Most High is 
just as good as honoring Him, or, that sacrifice is an 
acceptable service in lieu of obedience ? 

Verily, it is an evil day for this world, when its religion is 
separated from its work, and an unsanctified morality is left 
to save men from their sufferings, and to mend their manner 
of life ; and the whole of piety is reduced to the matter of 
worship and the saving of men's souls after they are dead. 
X o wonder that the higher law is formally excluded from the 
halls of Legislation, and that conscience is held subordinate 
to expediency and compromise, when all the good there is in 
religion is supposed to be just as available to the sinner as to 
the saint ! 

" What is truth ? " said Pilate; and turned away from 
the presence of its embodiment ; for he meant not an inquiry 
but a denial of its existence in any system of opinions, and, 
of all certainty concerning it. Had he waited for the answer 
that concerned him in his office of Governor, he would not 
have baptized his hands to wash away the blood he was about, 
in the indifference of his skepticism, to shed. That man is 
the type of those who ask, scornfully or doubtfully, what is 



386 THE FAITH OF CESAR'S HOUSEHOLD. 

truth ? or, what is its authority over us ? And it is not too 
much to say that his despair and suicide are a better and 
more wholesome commentary upon his base and cowardly 
abuse of political power to gratify the public, than a late 
repentance, compelled either by fear or hope, or any other 
selfish motive, would have been. 

It is perhaps too much to expect tombstones to tell truth ; 
yet there is nothing so sacred in sorrow as in the law by 
which we live for the highest ends of our being ; and when 
politicians in high places preach, they must be held answer- 
able to the canons of a just criticism. 

We are not interfering here with men's opinions in specu- 
lative doctrine ; we are defending, in our legitimate sphere, 
the good of men's lives. We are concerned every way to 
insist that men's responsibilities, particularly those of men in 
places of political trust, both here and hereafter, are highest 
and gravest in respect to the duties which they owe to maa, 
to the world, to the future of this world. We think it our 
business to rebuke the prevalent practice of judging the 
future condition of distinguished dead men. Our proper 
judgment is of their past work. That touches us who are 
alive, and all who are to live after us ; and what have we to 
do with the final state of any soul, more than we should feel 
for the soul of every other man ? If a distinguished life has 
blessed the world, God and man will in good time repay the 
benefit with " Well done good and faithful servant." But 
there is no room for favoritism here ; justice is due to the 
living, and it were much better that any man die for the 
world than that the world suffer for him. Dust and ashes 
have no intrinsic merits. Truth to the living is of even higher 
moment than eloquence in eulogies and epitaphs. The Lord 
buried Moses in the mountain, and gave him no monument 
ana no honors other than those of his works ; He took up 



HERO WORSHIP. 387 

Elijah in a chariot of fire ; nothing remained, either of the 
politician, or of the prophet, of Israel, but their words and 
their deeds, ^ay, more : the Evangelists wrote no eulogies 
upon their deceased Master. The appointed memorial of His 
earthly life is in the symbols of His blood shed, and His body 
broken, for the benefit of men. That is His epitaph ; and its 
voice to every man is, " Take up your cross also and follow 
me," not in profession and faith, but in facts and works ; 
throughout your lives. 

In all this we are not objecting to any honors, public or 
private, which reverence and grief suggest for the dead, but 
to the pernicious doctrines which get some sanctity from sor- 
row, and too much allowance from fashion. "We have no 
respect for lower law piety, even on funeral parade, and, for 
that reason, enter our protest. 



HERO WORSHIP. 

It seems inevitable, and justified, therefore, by the instinct 
which prompts it. Moses forbade the paying of Divine 
honors and adoration to anything below the Supreme Deity, 
but the precept failed with the children of Israel. The Jew- 
ish Chronicles are crowded with their idolatries ; and the 
prophet Ezekiel, summing up the evidence, declares that in 
this sin they had corrupted their way more than all the 
nations of the. Gentiles. 

That excellence which is the hope and trust of the human 
heart can be realized only in its incarnate form. Unmixed 
spiritualism is absolutely impossible to our mixed constitution. 
The Highest can only be apprehended as the model humanity. 



388 HERO WORSHIP. 

Men lelievi that they are made in His image. When He is 
defined by the negatives of all that we are and know, the idea 
is lost out of our words, and we fall back again upon our 
own highest conceptions of wisdom, power, and goodness. 
The Pagan theologies, Egyptian, Greek and Oriental, all 
alike rested in such manifestations of the Divine as human 
faculties are capable of ; they stopped short of the ultimate 
and absolute Divinity ; and our own religion never spread 
throughout the world until the Immanuel, or " God with us," 
brought the central idea within the grasp of human faculties. 
We personify Infinite perfection, indeed, as we do wisdom, 
love, power ; but our communion is only with such limitation 
and manifestation of it as we can identify and realize. 

The Divme messenger must come to us in human form, or 
we cannot receive him. 

The doctrine which denies the incarnation of the Supreme 
Divinity is false to the human constitution, out of harmony 
with its necessities, and, by refusing such veritable embodi- 
ment of the Godhead as the mind and heart can recognize, 
merely installs a set of principles in His place — substituting 
Law for Being. 

Hero-worship, saint-worship, angel-worship, in the degree 
of their worthiness or worthshijp, and within the limits of 
their functions, is nothing else than the natural action of the 
same inherent tendency. 

Faith and hope look upward. " Every good gift and 
every perfect gift cometh down from above," and we instinc- 
tively refer the greatest of them to the supernatural powers. 

History deals with the facts of sense only ; but history 
finds society in conditions which must be accounted for ; 
and, out of the dim traditions which precede it, never fails 
to construct a heroic age. The great men who discovered 
the sciences, revealed the religion and laws, and founded the 



HERO WORSHIP. 389 

cities and empires, whose origin is to be explained, are all 
Divine agents — they are heroes and demi-gods ; they have 
human mothers, but they must have Divine fathers. From 
the deluge of Deucalion to the introduction of the Olympiads 
into chronology, the benefactors of men, whose works lived 
after them in the gratitude and admiration of their country- 
men, all received this sort of deification. Hercules, Perseus, 
Theseus, Castor, Pollox, Esculapius, and a hundred others, 
were sons of Jupiter, Neptune, and Apollo. These were 
honored after their death by annual commemorations at their 
tombs, and by offerings and libations presented to them, 
much as we celebrate the anniversaries of our own mighty 
dead with festivals, speeches, and toasts drank standing. 
Sometimes the respect paid exceeded these limits, and they 
were exalted to the rank and honors of gods. Even in this 
we are perhaps not utterly at variance with them, for it is a 
received doctrine of Christianity, that the Church is built 
''on the foundation of the prophets and apostles, Jesus Christ 
being the chief corner-stone." To us, as to them, the heroes of 
faith and the chief reformers of the world, were fully inspired, 
and we obey them as the representatives and ambassadors 
of the Most High. 

Moreover, " the mighty men which were of old — men of 
renown," are spoken of in the book of Genesis, as the off- 
spring of intermarriages between "the sons of God and 
the daughters of men." These were the giants, the Titans, 
of the Hebrews. The birth of Isaac, of Jacob and Esau, 
and of the Patriarchs, the heads of the twelve tribes, are 
all ascribed to supernatural interposition by the same 
authority. The same thing is affirmed, also, of Samuel and 
Samson and other heroes of the early Jewish history, and it 
is even repeated in the story of John the Baptist. 

Thus Nature is ever refreshed by the supernatural, and 



390 HERO WORSHIP. 

Providence is not a mere bundle of general, permanent, 
uniform laws. There is an oracle in the human nature, and 
poetry is its authorized interpreter. In an age of material- 
ism, men may pay their devotions to mechanics, the work of 
their own hands, after the meanest form of idolatry ; never- 
theless, to as many as receive the Incarnate Divinity, the 
power is given to become the sons of God ; their bread shall 
be flesh, and their wine the blood of eternal life. 

But this faith looks forward as well as backward. As it 
fades in history it revives in prophecy. If it dies as a super- 
stition, it is born again a religion that inherits all its goods. 
In the Hebrew oracles it promises that " the seed of the 
woman shall bruise the serpent's head/' and, more definitely, 
" a virgin shall bear a son," who shall restore all things. 
St. Paul records the fulfilment in these significant words : 
11 There is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, 
the man Christ Jesus ; n whom he elsewhere declares to be 
" the image of the invisible God, the first-born of every crea- 
ture," " His only begotten Son." The language of Jesus 
covers this whole doctrine : " I came dozen from heaven, not 
to do my own will, but the will of my Father that sent me ;" 
and, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no man 
cometh unto the Father, but by me." Thus the universal 
truth is affirmed by our highest authority, and the instincts 
of human nature are justified while they are rectified. 

But, what says the natural religion of the pagan world to 
this doctrine of incarnation ? According to the Brahmins, 
their Vishnu has already had ten Avatars or appearances 
upon the earth. Their sacred books say that he interposes 
in human form, whenever any great calamity threatens the 
world, and that he is always born of the Divine Spirit and a 
maid. Boodhism, which is professed by nearly half the inha- 
bitants of the earth, teaches that there have been already 



HERO WORSHIP. 391 

four incarnations of Boodh in this world, and one is yet to 
come ; or rather, each Boodh is a new existence, but all 
appear on earth through the medium of human parentage. 
According to Lamaism, the supreme divinity is in constant 
process of metempsychosis, and is always present on the 
earth in a human form. Fo, the god of Japan, was born of 
a nymph ; the god of Siam is the offspring of a virgin and 
the sun ; Juggernaut is the son of a virgin, and the Casta 
Diva of the Druids was expected to bring forth a world 
redeemer ; and, to show the universality of the idea, it needs 
only to be added that the Paraguay Indians held, that, long 
ago a virgin bore a son who worked miracles, and finally 
rose in the air and became the sun. 

This necessity of the human constitution has its' force in a 
lower application with those who refuse it as a religion. 
They, too, have a "better time coming," though they do not 
quite " look for a new heaven and a new earth ;" and the 
agency and leadership of eminently endowed men is also 
essential to their hope. The redemption, with them, must 
have its champions, just as the religionist relies upon the 
great atonement, with its apostles and martyrs, for the con- 
summation of his trust. Both alike understand that the 
redemption must be effected through the mediation of the 
same nature which sins and suffers. Ail through the ages 
of evil, prophets and "heroes fix the faith of all men ; the 
honors accorded to them vary according to the measure of 
man's apprehensions, but the feeling is still the same, whe- 
ther it stints itself to the admiration of the sentiments, or 
stretches up to the stature of a religious worship. 

Man-worship, as it is oppf obriously phrased, results from 
the fact that we apprehend nothing clearly which is wholly 
unlike humanity ; and in spite of our most refined spirituality, 
we ever anthropomorphise the deity, however pure the wor- 



892 ANTHROPOMORPHISM. 

ship of our human hearts, and however high the conceptions 
of our human intellect. 

The defence of the hero-worshipper is not difficult or dis- 
creditable. Nothing prevents but incapacity of heart or 
head, or, self-worship. It is a bullying style of dignity which 
refuses due homage to greatness, and it is always expressed 
with a swagger, except when the pretence is too limber with 
its conscious falsehood to take a sturdy attitude. It takes 
but little fancy to imagine the manifold elocution of the an- 
swer, " Is not this the carpenter's son ?" which the gaping 
crowd offered against the claims of the great Teacher, who 
stood in his simple majesty among them. 

Next to the prophet himself is the man who discerns and 
receives him ; it is for fools and snobs to congratulate them- 
selves that they do not feel the difference between themselves 
and the pivot men of their time. Infidelity toward God is 
not so common nor so injurious as unbelief in man. It is 
well that there is not so much of either as would destroy the 
hopes of this world or of the next. 



ANTHROPOMORPHISM. 

The Jewish religion, notwithstanding the almost miracu- 
lous tenacity with which the Israelitish nation has clung to it 
through eighteen centuries of dispersion and suffering, never 
had any proper power of self-propagation. Since the days 
of Moses, not a tribe or nation of the Gentile world, down 
to the present day, has accepted it. The reason of such 
general and persistent rejection of a system, containing so 
many excellences, both of civil polity and moral principles, 
must be in its intrinsic repugnance to the governing senti- 
ments of^mankind in matters of theological faith. Its civil 



ANTHROPOMORPHISM. 393 

code and social order were, during all the period of Asiatic 
and European barbarism, quite superior to any other system ; 
and its criminal code was not specially exceptionable to the 
nations around it, but its doctrine of the divine nature, and 
the religious system thence derived, was, and still continues 
to be, wholly unacceptable. Christianity, though admit- 
ting the Jewish revelation as a fact, no more accepts its 
peculiarity than do the heathen religions prevailing over the 
rest of the earth. Indeed, the difficulties of the Jewish 
theological doctrine, which have ever prevented its spread 
among the nations, were so impracticable to the Jews them- 
selves, that their own sacred books prove them to have been 
as thorough polytheists and idolaters in practice as any other 
people. While their lawgiver was yet with them they com- 
pelled Aaron, the high priest of the new religion, to make a 
golden calf for their worship; and, a thousand years after- 
wards, Ezekiel charges them with having " corrupted their 
way" by the worship of false gods more than all the Gen- 
tiles. The history of their Judges and Kings through the 
whole interval, is crowded with the proofs of their obstinate 
idolatry, and even Solomon, who built their temple, "went 
after other gods," and built "high places" for the service 
of the idols of the Moabites, Ammonites and the other 
gods of his thousand wives. Manasseh, after him, "built 
altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house 
of the Lord," and other kings of Judah put "the horses of 
the sun" at the portals of the sacred edifice! So that the 
simple and absolute spiritualism of Moses, which commanded, 
"Thou shalt have no other Gods before me; thou shalt not 
make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything 
that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or 
that is in the water under the earth; thou shalt not bow 
down thyself to them, nor serve them," failed as utterly of 

If* 



394 ANTHROPOMORPHISM. 

securing obedience among the Jews, as it did among the 
heathen Greeks, whose divinities reached the round number 
of thirty thousand in the days of Herodotus. 

But a very small portion of professing Christians and a 
very few philosophers, have ever fairly accepted the doctrine 
of the simple unity of the Divine nature, rejecting at the 
same time, the notion of a celestial hierarchy, by which the 
mass of mankind in all ages has supposed the government of 
the universe to be administered. Perhaps it is not too much 
to affirm that no considerable sect or party of religionists, 
has ever yet embraced the simple spirituality of the Deity 
whom they worship. It is certain, at least, that the religion 
of the Bible never spread over the earth until it presented 
an incarnate God to the apprehension and faith of men. It 
is the Immanuel or God with us, the God-man, manifested in 
the flesh, that achieved the victory over the heathen systems, 
and it is through his name that we approach unto the Father. 
He is the way through which the faith that we call Christian- 
ity is received by the church at this day. An abstract Divin- 
ity is possible to the imagination of metaphysical thinkers, 
but human affections, human hope and worship, cannot get 
a firm hold of attributes and modes of existence wholly 
unlike its own. St. Paul meets this point fairly when he 
contrasts the religion of Jesus with that proclaimed by 
Moses. He says, ".We have not a high priest which cannot 
be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all 
points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." "For, 
verily, he took not on him the nature of angels, but he took 
on him the seed of Abraham." And the Evangelist, John, 
says, "the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and 
we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the 
Father." In nothing, indeed, is the great apostle of the 
Gentile world more emphatic than that there is one God, and 



ANTHROPOMORPHISM. 395 

one Mediator between God and man, the Man Christ Jesus," 
"who being the brightness of his (Father's) glory, and the 
express image of his person, and upholding all things by the 
word of his power, when he had, by himself purged our sins, 
sat clown on the right hand of the Majesty on high." 

The necessity of the human heart, here so fully met and 
answered, has led men all over the world, and in all ages, to 
invent for themselves Gods in human form, born of women, 
but with divine fathers ; and Christianity owes its first ele- 
ment of success to the indulgence of this idea, while it derives 
its chief power to command human acceptance from the 
pathos of the Redeemer's story and the beneficence and 
beauty of his doctrines. TTe think that for these reasons 
the triumph of our religion is not a miracle, but far better 
than a miracle, in its perfect adjustment to the qualities and 
conditions of our humanity, and in its truth, which such 
adjustment demonstrates. 

Judaism defines God by negatives; it declares only what 
he is not, and what he is not like; it reduces him to an 
abstract power or principle, and so is nearly impossible of 
apprehension; but Christianity presents all that we can pos- 
sibly receive of Him as an actual individualized being in the 
person and character of Christ, and he thereby becomes to 
us capable of distinct and positive realization. 

This idea must not be misunderstood. "We talk of love, jus 
tice, power, holiness, goodness and truth, intelligibly enough, 
but they are only principles in our apprehension; we know 
them only by what we possess of them ; we can admire 
them as qualities of beings ; but, only when they are imperso- 
nated in a familiar and knowable form of existence, in absolute 
perfection, can we love, worship, and trust in them, for all that 
we desire, need, and depend upon. A perfect or divine man 
only can be a veritable, tangible God to human beings, and, 



396 ANTHROPOMORPHISM. 

whatsoever is beyond this, or different from it, we can have no 
knowledge of and no vital faith in. — If we had no revealed 
incarnation of the Deity, we would, like our heathen brethren, 
of necessity embody our ideas of his character in some appreci- 
able form, and, perhaps, most men do this, everywhere, after 
the fashion of their own conceptions, notwithstanding the for- 
mal faith which they profess. 

The conclusion of natural reason, therefore, corresponds 
essentially to the declaration of Jesus: — "I am the way, 
and the truth, and the life, and no man cometh unto the 
Father but by me." 

The character of the God is but the ideal of the worship- 
per; this is so, because it cannot be otherwise. The Deity 
of a harsh, cruel, implacable man is a very different being 
from that of a gentle, loving, merciful spirit. " Ye imagine 
me altogether such an one as yourselves," is the rebuke of 
Old Testament inspiration uttered against the profane fancies 
of a base and corrupt people, attesting the general fact which 
we allege, at the same time that the grossness of the false 
conception is censured. The necessity of a divine representa- 
tion in an appreciable form is, nevertheless, (aught by John, 
who declares that "No man hath seen God at any time; the 
only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father, he 
hath declared him." — Jesus, to the same effect, says, "The 
Father himself which hath sent me, hath borne witness of 
me. Ye have neither heard his volbe at any time, nor seen 
his shape." Again, answering a question by the Apostle 
Thomas, he says, "If ye had known me, ye should have 
known the Father also;" and when Philip replied, "Lord, 
show us the Father, and it sufficeth us," Jesus saith unto 
him, "have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou 
not known me, Phillip ? he that hath seen me, hath seen the 
Father." 



ANTHROPOMORPHISM. 



391 



But the same idea pervades all religions. The executive 
Deity of the Greeks and Romans rested in a divinized 
humanity. They pretended to no apprehension of the abso- 
lute and infinite Godhead. Their creator of the universe 
was also an eternal son. For him, and by him, all things 
were made; he, according to their system, "was before all 
things, and by him all things consist," as St. Paul says of 
the Christ. In the mythological story the King of the Gods 
took the dominion from his father; Jesus says, "all power 
is given unto me both in heaven and in earth." 

Nearer than such vicegerency in a divinized humanity, mor- 
tal comprehension cannot approach the Supreme, higher than 
this, mortal worship cannot reach toward an individualized 
Deity. Polytheism differs from the doctrine of Unity in the 
supernal power, only in the fundamental point that it divides 
the infinite perfections into many personalities, and destroys 
the harmony of their essential oneness in quality and action, 
just as if the several faculties of the human nature were dis- 
tributed among as many individuals, making each a monster 
and a monomaniac by the divorcement. They divinized the 
virtues and demonized the vices of our complex constitution, 
and embodied them in a mob of celestial and infernal gods. 
Hence a perpetual war in their heaven corresponding to the 
strife of the unbalanced' impulses in man. The true religion 
finds all perfection in One Supreme, and that supreme is the 
human nature carried* up in idea to infinite perfection, but 
still in the form and fashion of manhood. 



398 MYTHOLOGY. 



MYTHOLOGY. 



It is not at all probable that the highly civilized and 
polished nations of antiquity meant to idolize and worship 
the vices which they ascribed to their gods. Their error in 
theory began in the separation of the various virtues w.hich 
they recognized as existing in the pattern or Divine nature. 
The justice, wisdom, purity, and love of the highest style of 
being, they separated from each other, and ascribed to a plu- 
rality of divinities, providing an embodiment for each sepa- 
rate faculty in the analysis. Of these they had as many as 
they imagined were the faculties, intellectual and moral, in 
their ideal of- supreme perfection. Such divorce of the qua- 
lities and powers which constitute the Infinite, works at once 
all the resulting mischief, making as it were, so many mono- 
maniacs out of one integral existence. No faculty of human 
nature, however excellent, but becomes a crime and a mad- 
ness so soon as it works unchecked and unbalanced by the 
harmonies of the whole nature. Justice runs into cruelty, 
mercy into misgovernment, and love to licentiousness, unless 
restrained and directed by all the feelings and ideas which 
meet the general relations of the life, and take care of all the 
interests and bearings of the case. Their Venus is a profli- 
gate, and Diana only a prude, but combined in one being 
they would have afforded a divine love nature, rich, beautiful 
and holy ; and so of a hundred other cases. 

Especially is the system liable to misapprehension and 
injurious construction in the offices and agents to which they 
distributed the creation and current government, or general 
and special providence, of the world. Jupiter's amours seem 
monstrous, and the invention of the fables a wantonness, 
beyond expression and endurance, unless they are regarded 



"HEAVEN — A KINGDOM OF USES." 399 

merely as a mode of illustrating the generating and procre- 
ating ; or life-giving power, manifest in the animal and vege- 
table kingdoms, and referred by our religion, as well as 
theirs, to the Supreme Being, in words, instead of unseemly 
symbols and allusions. Put all the instances together, and 
they will represent collectively the " Author of life 77 to all 
forms of sentient existence. This being possible and proba- 
ble, we but do injustice to human nature by putting a 
grosser and more literal construction upon the allegory. 
The luxuries of the senses were, indeed, coarsely authorized, 
but the abuse rested in the fact of independence of the 
lower enjoyments upon the higher principles and feelings ; 
for, in themselves, they are allowable under such regulation 
as will harmonize them with the whole nature of man. So 
balanced, they are no mean part of the good of oiir existence. 
Their worship of the dead heroes of the earth was but the 
homage due to greatness, exaggerated by a lively faith in the 
power of departed spirits in affairs of the present life, or 
another form of angel ministrations. And thus the whole 
system, with all its abuses, can be reconciled to an idea 
deeper and purer than at first strikes the mind. 



HEAVEN— A KINGDOM OF USES. 

The Egyptians held the immortality of the soul, and of the 
body also. Immediately after death, according to their the- 
ology, the soul appeared before forty-two judges or assessors 
(In their philosophy there were forty-two crimes or sins that 
a man might commit). If acquitted by all these, he was 



400 "HEAVEN — A KINGDOM OF USES." 

carried before Osiris, their chief divinity. In his presence 
the heart and brains of the person on trial were put into 
one end of a balance, and a feather from the wing of the 
angel of Truth, into the other. If he balanced the feather on 
this trial, he was admitted into the Elysium. But now his 
orduals commenced ; and the character of the discipline and 
tests bears some general resemblance to the ceremonial of 
Free Masonry. At the door of the Hall of Judgment, for 
instance, he was challenged successively by the door-sill, the 
right jamb, the left jamb, the door, the janitor, and by every 
tile in the floor, and every article of furniture. Each demand- 
ed of him its proper name, and the meaning thereof, and 
his advance depended upon the accuracy of the response. 

This is an expressive form of the Sphinx riddle of the 
Greeks. " Tell me my riddle, or I will destroy you," says 
everything which the spirit meets in its onward progress. 
•" Pronounce my name, i. e. describe my nature — show that 
you know me, before you can pass me to higher experiences 
and achievements." This is the law of our being, and the 
condition of our progress. To know and to enjoy, are words 
that mean the same thing in our Scriptures ; they mean the 
same thing in fact and in truth. Could there be a finer 
allegory, by which to illustrate the law of endless advance- 
ment and its requirements, than this one of the Egyptian 
Mythology. 

After the soul is> pronounced " not guilty" by the forty- 
two judges, of any crime or sin, and after the judgment of 
Osiris decides that the heart and brain are true, then the 
ordeals begin — the trial, the discipline, of the ever opening 
future. How much more sensible this than the notion of a 
final trial, and a flat, insipid eternity of idleness thereafter ! 
"jS^ot guilty" will do to begin with ; but the probation in 
the greatest affairs of existence only begins there, and the 



"ROMANIZING TENDENCY/' 401 

soul must work its way up to its destiny, or be ordered 
back. 

By the way, the Egyptians believed that when the spirit 
did not pass- muster, it was sent back in the form of a pig, 
driven by monkeys, to begin its earthly pilgrimage over again. 
That second turn is not so certain ; but the pig and the 
monkeys are capital notions, if it were so. Pig bodies with 
monkey drivers ! There could not be a more wholesome 
horror than that. 



"ROMANIZING TENDENCY." 

The Synod of the Reformed Dutch Church, at its late 
session in Philadelphia, resolved to suspend its correspondence 
with the German Reformed Church,, inasmuch " as the con- 
tinuance of the same may be regarded as lending the sanction 
of this Synod to sentiments and doctrines which are favorable 
to the corrupt views of the Church of Rome, which are 
advocated by many persons of distinguished character in the 
German Reformed Church, and have not been reprimanded 
by the authorities of the said Church." 

The Catholic papers have published a list of the names of 
distinguished conversions to the Romish Church, which have 
occurred in this country within the last ten years, stating by 
the way, that it is not nearly complete. Nineteen Episco- 
palian Ministers are named among these converts, viz : 
Revs. J. R. Bayley, Dr. Forbes, Thomas S. Preston, Dr. 
Huntington, Donald McLeod, Ferdinand E. White, Mr. 
Richards, Mr. Loutrel, Mr. Burchard, William Everett, Mr. 
Pollard, and Mr. Stoughton, all of New York ! Rev. Dr. 
L..S. Ives, Bishop of North Carolina ; Mr. Shaw, of Alaba- 



402 "ROMANIZING TENDENCY." 

ma; Mr. Baker, of Baltimore ; Mr. Hewitt, of Connecticut; 
Mr. Hoyt, of Vermont ; Mr. Major, of Philadelphia; and 
Mr. Wadham, of Albany. Protestant Ministers of other 
denominations — Dr. O. A. Brownson and George Leach of 
Boston ; Prof. Oertel and Porter Thomas, of New York ; 
and Rev. William J. Bake well, of Pittsburgh, who was the 
immediate successor of the celebrated Mathew Henry, the 
great commentator upon the Bible, as pastor of his congre- 
gation at Chester, England, if we recollect rightly, afterwards 
pastor of the Unitarian congregation at Pittsburgh, after 
that, again, an Episcopalian clergyman, and now a member 
of the Mother Church. His son, Robert A. Bakewell, editor 
of the Shepherd of the Valley, is another convert who bids 
fair by his zeal and talents to rank with the most distinguished 
of these conquests from Protestantism. 

Thirteen officers of the army and six of the navy, are added 
to the list of the captures taken in the ten years' holy war. 
The names of the " honorable women^not a few/ 7 are with- 
held from a feeling of propriety ; but it is intimated that they 
are very numerous, and we doubt not that such is the fact. 

The Virgin Mary, " Mother of God and Queen of Hea- 
ven " inserted into the Catholic Trinity, for obvious reasons, 
is a very efficient supernumerary force in its divinity ; and 
the ample provision for enthusiasm, made by the Church, is 
an opening for the devotees of faith and charity, which gives 
it immense advantages over the more simple and common- 
place institutions of Protestantism. These things work 
according to the laws of human nature, and it requires but 
little philosophy to perceive the larger and more natural 
adjustment of the ancient Church to the diverse wants of the 
wide world than the reformation allows. If there was 
nothing but the feminine element in the divinity, supplied by 
the Catholic creed, which the Protestant lacks, the difference 



REFORMERS. 403 

must tell decisively ; but many another want is met, and 
urgent necessity of the heart provided for, which must go far 
to counterbalance the faults of the one side, and the peculiar 
excellences of the other. Auricular confession ; intercession 
of the saints ; pomp and ceremonial impressiveness of public 
worship ; mystic sacredness of the priesthood ; efficiency of 
prayer and sacrifice for the benefit of the dead ; antiquity 
and universality of the church — all have their effect, which suf- 
fers but little abatement from the historical offences which 
she has committed against the rights and liberties of man- 
kind, in a country like this, where her powers for evil are not 
felt and but little feared. 

That Catholicism is on the increase among us at a great 
rate, is obvious enough. A similar process is going on in 
England. It requires to be looked into. Providence, we 
think, intends to call the attention of Protestantism to its 
own condition by this means. The wisest use and the best 
that the reformed churches can make of it, will be to occupy 
' themselves less with the faults of the old enemy, and look 
more sharply to the amendment of their own. Their own 
goodness will be the best argument they can offer against 
her abuses. 



REFORMERS. 

Religion is a necessity of our nature, and worship is the 
instinct of our noblest faculties, but establishments must 
answer our uses, or they must perish. In this lies the error 
of over-strained conservatism: it allows no change of forms, 
qo variation of agencies, and no extension of principles to 
new requirements, or the correction of old abuses. It dams 



404 REFORMERS. 

up the tide of progress in the vain hope of turning it back 
upon its source. It admits no reformation, and thereby 
invites revolution. The turbulent waters that cannot be 
restrained, and should not have been checked, may overpass 
their proper boundaries and waste something that deserved 
to live, but the blame rests with the barrier that lifted the 
waves above their natural level and compelled them into vio- 
lence. 

The reformer has ever a fearful mission to fulfil. As des- 
troyer of the old and builder of the new, he is responsible at 
once for the good that he finds and the evil he occasions. 
His reverence for the past and his fears for the future, are 
alike torturing. He cannot turn his back upon the unburied 
dead without pain, nor look forward upon the experiment to 
which he subjects the unborn without misgiving. His sur- 
passing love is returned in hatred, and his devotion is 
rewarded with death, yet, not his will but the will of heaven 
must be done. He accepts the shame and suffering of a 
rejected redeemer, and, for the hope set before him, does his 
appointed work, though, for the present, it overturns the 
temple and destroys the State. 

It is the mystery of iniquity that the men of every age 
have killed the prophets and stoned all those that were sent 
unto them. When worship has been changed into a trade, 
the priesthood into oppressors, and the temple become a den 
of thieves; men answer a righteous remonstrance that, "it 
was forty and six years a-building, and they have Abraham 
for their father I" and, therefore, stone the preacher of truth 
for blasphemy ! 

The Church now, should learn from the fate of those which 
it has replaced, that God is not bound by a covenant which 
on its part has been broken, and that men will not continue 
to reverence an institution which its own corruption has dis- 



REFORMERS. 405 

honored. The cry of heretic, Sabbath-breaker, blasphemer, 
infidel, pestilent fellow, now, as in the olden time, means 
nothing if untrue, and has no force if it is not fact. The 
true religion must be vindicated, the world's highest welfare 
secured, and whatsoever opposes itself will be destroyed. 

We are not of those who would trample down the wheat 
in weeding out the tares, but we cannot call that the vineyard 
of the Lord which yields only wild grapes where we look for- 
good ones. — We think that a religion which looks only 
towards the next world, but does no good and much harm 
to the present one, is not only a meagre sham but an oppres- 
sive evil, and thinking so, we say so ; for by its fruits we 
may judge it. We are authorized to say that men are not 
of the Lord who do not love their brethren. The charity 
of almsgiving and the observance of days, do not satisfy us, 
but the establishment of justice and the reform of evil. God 
is not mocked, and men are not long deceived. 

When profession contributes to social respect and pecu- 
niary profit, it is natural for crime to fly to the altar for 
sanctuary. It is the popularity of religion that endangers 
its purity and perverts its influence. Wherever the Church 
is strong enough in popular respect to denounce heresy with 
effect, and stamp the man with infamy whom it calls infidel, 
it is too much of this world to be faithful to it or to the 
other. Jesus and his apostles denounced the priesthood of 
their day, but they instructed and persuaded the Sadducees 
-and unbelievers. It was the rich and the great, the hypo- 
crite and the oppressor, not the misguided fanatic or the 
reckless profligate, that they denounced. And they never 
appealed to the prejudices of piety, or the fears »f conserva- 
tism, to silence their opponents. Especially did they not 
lend their countenance and sanction to the social injustice 
and individual oppression of the times. They were reform- 



406 REFORMERS. 

ers, not Pharisees, arid that is the reason why their names 
were east out as evil, and themselves crucified, for religion's 
sake. 

Our reformers may not modestly claim too close a resem- 
blance to their character ; but their fate is enough like to 
suggest it, and the position and conduct of bigoted conser- 
vatism in our time, may see its own image in the hierarchy 
of theirs. In zeal for forms and ceremonies, sanctity and 
severity of ritual worship, missionary spirit, reverence for 
the word and the temple, scrupulous observance of formal 
prayer, abhorrence of reformers and unbelievers, almsgiving 
to the poor, austerity of manners and sectarian controver- 
sies, the priests and elders of the Jews were not to be 
excelled. The Christian Church was not instituted to rival 
or surpass them in these things. It is the weightier mat- 
ters of the law — -justice, mercy and truth, neglected by them, 
that are enjoined upon us as our distinguishing duty. And 
our priesthood must at least lend " so much as one of their 
fingers " to lift the burdens from the shoulders of the poor 
and oppressed, if they would justify and maintain their 
position. Heaven will not tolerate a;nd humanity will not 
long endure such sad perversion of their functions. Temple 
and altar have no more sacredness in themselves than tower 
and fortress. Providential reformations make no account 
of rituals, sacrifices, and fanes, from which the Divine pre- 
sence has departed ; and the ordinances that are perverted, 
and the institutions which have lost their beneficence, are 
swept away as rubbish by the roused retribution of heaven 
and earth. 



H 



THE END 



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